This Dark Thing That Sleeps In Me
by BroadwayStarletQueen
Summary: Sherlock makes an unfathomable choice at the pool-he decides to give up on his life of detection to join Moriarty in a life of high-stakes crime and entertainment. When he finds himself pitted against the evil team, John finds himself questioning if Sherlock's playing a game or giving in to darkness...and if he's lost the Sherlock he might have been a bit in love with.
1. Chapter 1

**Hi, lovely readers! Your kind comments have encouraged me to try something a bit out of my comfort zone-a dark, angsty Sherlock fic. The title is a quote from Sylvia Plath, and the beginning dialogue as well as the characters are not mine. I really like the idea of John fighting because he so fervently believes in Sherlock Holmes, but slowly realizing that Sherlock might be lost forever.**

**Review and leave suggestions-I haven't finished the story pre-upload, so suggestions and ideas are welcome!**

* * *

"I've given you a glimpse, Sherlock, just a teensy glimspe of what I've got going on out there in the big bad world. I'm a specialist, you see...like you..." Moriarty's Cheshire grin glinted a soft blue in the light of the pool, making him seem as ephemeral and eerie as a ghost. The easy smile, the echoing chuckle, the long-dead eyes-they all contributed to the sense that Moriarty wasn't really there.

If Sherlock was scared, he didn't show it. His aim remained steady as he sneered, "Dear Jim...please will you fix it for me...to get rid of my lover's nasty sister? Dear Jim, please will you fix it for me to disappear to South America?"

Moriarty only smirked boyishly. "Just so."

John noticed it then, out of the corner of his eye. Out of all the fear and adrenaline pumping in his veins and chlorine smell bouncing off his senses, he saw what Sherlock did, because John Watson always notices what Sherlock Holmes does.

Sherlock simply smiled lightly to himself, breathing in hushed admiration. "Consulting criminal. Brilliant."

"Isn't it?" Moriarty grinned back. "No one ever gets to me... and no one ever will."

"I did." Sherlock couldn't suppress the smugness, the pride-somehow, he'd been the only person on earth to get this close, and oh, did that tickle him. It was his birthday and Christmas all wrapped into one homicidal package. The frailty of genius-Sherlock had an audience now.

John groaned inwardly. _Don't be a git-now's not the time to brag, Holmes._

"You've come the closest," Moriarty conceded. "Now you're in my way."

"Thank you."

"Didn't mean that as a compliment."

"Yes, you did."

"Yeah okay, I did. But the flirting's over now, Sherlock, Daddy's had enough now!" Moriarty relished the eccentricity, making his voice sound like a whale just to put them off. "I've shown you what I can do, I cut lose all those people. All those little problems, even thirty million quid just to get you to come out and play. So take this as a friendly warning, my dear-back off." At this, Moriarty smiled to himself again, all boyish charm after a decidedly fatal warning. "Although I have loved this, this little game of ours, playing Jim from IT, playing gay. Did you like the little touch with the underwear?"

Sherlock blinked, and John saw it again, the dreaded spark of something he never wanted to see in his friend's eye: interest. Sherlock was interested. He licked his lips once and continued, "You like games."

"Oh, only when they're fun. And I've never had so much fun as I've had with you, Sherly. Playing games with ordinary people, oh..." Moriarty clicked his tongue in annoyance. "They never get my jokes. And I'm always sooo clever, too, so it's quite a shame. But you get the jokes, my dear."

"It's not like you make them especially difficult," Sherlock replied with an eye roll, and John's skin began to crawl. Something was wrong now. Sherlock was no longer in control. Sherlock was enjoying this, on some level.

John cleared his throat to speed up the negotiations. "Right. Well. This has been a wonderful chat, Moriarty-we get the message. If you could just call off the snipers and get rid of this nasty bomb, we'll be out of your hair."

Jim didn't even bother to glance at John. "Do you like games, Mr. Holmes? Your daft older brother doesn't... Pity."

"I am not," Sherlock seethed, "my brother."

"No, I'm getting that now," Moriarty mused. He took a few steps closer to Sherlock, who kept the gun trained at eye level, only a few feet away from Moriarty's brain. "No, I think you're a bit more fun, indeed. You haven't done the obvious thing, which is intriguing."

"You're wondering why I'm not threatening to shoot you right now? Why I haven't already done it?"

"Go on, impress me."

Sherlock gave him a withering look and gestured around the pool carelessly with the gun. "Doesn't matter if I shoot-I'd be dead in seconds, and so would John. In fact, the shock from the bullet into John's vest would cause this entire pool to blow up." He chuckled quietly to himself. "Bit of a waste."

"Good." Moriarty nodded and stood directly in front of Sherlock, only inches away from the taller man's face but not a bit perturbed. Sherlock let the gun hang in his hand by his side. "Now, dear, do you see why I'm at a bit of an impasse?"

"You want to kill me," Sherlock reasoned, "but that's...obvious."

"Right."

"And dull."

"Oh, especially so."

"If I don't die tonight, you and I will fight each other to the very end. Entertaining, at least for a while, but eventually distracting and on the whole, rather unenjoyable. So, one solution, then." Before he spoke, Sherlock swallowed and his blue eyes flickered to John's, who had been trying to keep his breathing in check during this exchange. _Aim the bloody gun_, John thought angrily in Sherlock's direction. _Aim it and blow his brains out before he hurts anyone else, you idiot!_

If Sherlock could gauge any of that from John's glare, he didn't let on. Instead, he gave a disinterested sigh and said the last thing John Watson ever expected, ever wanted, him to say.

"What's the point of fighting, then?"

John breathed, "No," nearly about to run to Sherlock and pull him away, and even Moriarty blinked in surprise.

"Sorry?"

"The amount of entertainment we can enjoy from an intellectual battle pales in comparison," Sherlock said, licking his lips again, "to the...fun we can have...if we join forces."

Moriarty's eyebrows nearly reached his hairline. "Are you proposing, dear? Oh, this is all a bit sudden, isn't it?" He chuckled loudly, echoes of his malicious laugh chilling John to the bone.

John shook his head once to himself, his entire brain a mess of _can't-be-happening-Sherlock-no-no-NO_, and tried to focus. Losing his head in a crisis like this wouldn't save anyone; had he learned nothing as a soldier? He focused his eyes on Sherlock, who was gazing coolly down at Moriarty, not a single hint of falseness on his face. He looked simply curious, intrigued...and on the edge of his gaze, John could see something, even in the low light of the pool. Something burning and deep, and...impossibly dark.

Darkness. A curious darkness, swallowing up Sherlock's irises and making his lips curl in an amused sneer. John had seen glimpses, of course, when Donovan's insults verged on the slanderous side and murderers taunted him. Peeks of anger and frustration and blackest rage, but nothing a cuppa wouldn't fix, or some crap telly. John recognized these signs and managed them, as he always had. "Sherlock," he said firmly. "Sherlock, what are you doing?"

"Call it an experiment, John. Or write it off as one of those crazy things the Freak does. I'm sure Anderson will agree with you." Sherlock's eyes never left Moriarty's smirking face.

"No," John argued. "You're not a freak, I've never said-I've _never_ said that. You're brilliant and a pain in the arse, sometimes, but never a freak. You have an obligation."

"To what, John?" Sherlock asked, finally tearing his eyes away from Moriarty's, and John couldn't help but jump back a little to see the anger that seized his pupils. "To a societal code that I have never understood, to a system of ethics I didn't choose to abide by? All my life..." Sherlock swallowed and looked past John's head, out somewhere none of the men could imagine. "All my life, I've been different. Better. More. But everyone, everyone I knew, everyone who should have tried to help a boy growing up alone with a dizzying intellect and ability to see what others cannot, told me to shove it. Told me to hide, John. Told me I was a freak and worse, told me to lock up the weird bits and be a good little boy and maybe, just maybe, one day I'd be normal enough for everyone else. Well, Johnny-boy," Sherlock repeated Moriarty's earlier pet name, "perhaps it's time I stopped locking myself up."

Moriarty's smile widened by miles. "Delicious. A tempting offer, Holmes, but how am I supposed to believe that you're willing to give your pretty pet and everything else up? If we band together, you're mine, and we work together on everything. That's going to include a bit of crime."

"That's where all the fun is, isn't it?" Sherlock said nonchalantly.

"I'm making sure you're not too queasy around murder. Lots of it."

"I told you, I'm quite finished with rules." Sherlock's gaze flickered back to the man in front of him. "Jim. I want to let go. I want to...be like you. I've been trying for years to be as normal as I can be, and all I've received is hatred in return. But you know, if you can't make them love you..." Sherlock grinned and discarded the gun. "...You can always make them fear you."

John broke at that. He was too scared to move in the bomb-suit, but he raised his voice and yelled, "You DIDN'T get hatred from me, Holmes! When has there ever been a time that I wanted you to be less than _what you are_?!"

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "I suppose John's right. He never hated me, did he? But he did try and put me into neat little boxes, packaging all my oddness away. Making me a better flatmate, a _friend_," he scoffed.

"I didn't try and put you into bloody boxes, I was trying to help you tap into your human side! The good parts of you, Sherlock, I know they're in there! You can't seriously be-" But then it dawned on John.

It was all part of the game.

Sherlock-brilliant Sherlock-was just calming Moriarty down. Oh, this was perfect. Lestrade would be here in minutes to capture Moriarty, the snipers would be taken out, this bloody vest would be off-all he had to do was play along.

Sherlock Holmes was a brilliant actor. No wonder he hadn't betrayed anything to John, not a single hint: it had to be believable. Well, John Watson wasn't a bad actor, either. He could fake his way through the next few minutes as the disbelieving flatmate. He coughed. "You can't seriously be considering this! You have a life back at 221B, with the Yard, with Mrs. Hudson, with...me!"

Sherlock chuckled. "Why not? What is even remotely interesting at 221B, besides boring, infantile old cases and a flatmate who objects to everything? You know, I bet Jim would let me keep body parts in the fridge..."

Moriarty laughed. "Now, now, children. Daddy loves you all equally...well, except Worthless over there."

"I don't believe you. You'd never go over to the dark side," John said, trying to hide the faintest traces of a laugh. Dark side? Oh, he and Sherlock were going to have a great time telling this story... He searched Sherlock's face for a clue, the slightest idea that they were on the right track.

Sherlock looked him over with a glance of disgust that someone would give a rat or cockroach. "And I suppose the next thing you're going to say is how much you 'believe in me' and how I have to stay with you, for your sake, because you've grown to care _oh-so-much_..."

John frowned. That wasn't part of the game. "Sorry?"

"Don't be dull, John, it's written all over your face. Worse, it's plain to see at every party and every outing when someone makes a joke about us and you throw the old litany out: 'not gay, not a couple, not me, I'm Captain Heterosexual Watson over here!' Everyone can see the pathetic way you look at me and do whatever I want and follow me around..."

"Sherlock."

"...and you claim you're not gay. You know what, Watson-you're right. You're just hopelessly in love with your flatmate and it kills you-"

"Sherlock, that's enough!" John didn't like this game anymore. Suddenly the lies pouring out of Sherlock's mouth were too close to the quick, cutting too close to the actual wounds, and he could feels walls going up, walls that Sherlock had denounced as his defense. _'Not Gay, Not a Couple, Stop This, Sherlock, Stop Talking...'_

"-to think that you've been wrong about yourself and you've been reduced to living as the PA of a brilliant man who will never feel for you the way you feel about him, and you're afraid if I actually take this chance," Sherlock said with a breath of malicious triumph, "that you'll lose your little live-in boyfriend who doesn't require any fancy jewelry or explanations to your family or effort on your part."

"Sherlock, stop-_talking_!" John yelled, forgetting the bombs and the snipers and charging at Sherlock full-force, letting Moriarty duck out of the way before smacking into Sherlock. "Take it, back, Sherlock-it's not true, not a word-"

"You know what you are, John?" Sherlock smiled lightly while John pummeled uselessly at him with his fists. "You're a pet. And I almost feel sorry for you."

At that, John's arms dropped to his sides and his head was left spinning, breathless and confused. Moriarty whistled and clapped slowly as John released him, letting Sherlock brush off his shoulders and stride toward Moriarty. "That was amusing to say the least, my dear. So, is that it, then? Little Sherlock wants to join Daddy in the big leagues?"

"If you'll have me," Sherlock agreed raggedly. "You're a smart man. Deduce it for yourself if you can't already see my intentions. I think I'm quite done being an angel-I've been destined for hell for so long, I might as well do a thorough job of getting there."

"No," John whispered to himself. This was still the lie, the trick... Any minute now, Lestrade would walk in and arrest the spider and they could go home, and Sherlock could apologize for the stunt he'd pulled.

Moriarty laughed softly at John's refusal to believe him. "What should we do with the pet, then? Is death too delicious?"

"Yes. I'll expect him to do the honorable thing and try and find a way this all works. He assumes it's a game, that I'm lying to save our skins, and he's going to try and prove it now." Sherlock smirked. "Adorable. Well, almost. Desperately trying to save the good name of the man he loves. Poetic, don't you think?"

"Nearly. Could be interesting-no point in a game if you don't have an opponent, and it will be so fun to watch him try and fight us!" Moriarty said gleefully. With a wave of his hand, the snipers' marks disappeared and there was nothing but the same stink of chlorine and sound of two men walking on the tile floor to the exit. "All right, then, we'll let Worthless alone for now. What did you have in mind to start us off, darling?"

"Oh, I have a game, Jim. And when it's over, if John's still floundering about, I'll even let you do the honors."

"This sounds like the beginning of a beautiful arrangement, Mr. Holmes."


	2. Chapter 2

"Let me just…get this straight, all right?" Lestrade sighed, rubbing his face for the hundredth time that night. He steepled his fingers—an action so reminiscent of Sherlock that John tensed in his chair—and blew out a short breath. "This bloke—James Moriarty—he's some consulting criminal who organizes and controls crimes, and he's the one who's been behind these 'games,' yeah?"

John only nodded, sipping out of his foam cup of brackish coffee. He hadn't made eye contact with Lestrade, or anyone, all night. He focused on the white walls of Lestrade's office with a bright orange shock blanket draped over his shoulders, still shaking from the terror of having a bomb strapped to him for so long.

Or so everyone assumed.

Lestrade sighed again and continued. "He's just as brilliant as Sherlock, just as clever and mad…but he's completely amoral and bonkers. And now Sherlock's joined forces with him."

Donovan shook her head from a corner of the room. "What did I tell you? One day he'd turn over, one day he'd go to the dark side and want to start facilitating the crimes—I fucking _told_ you, but did anyone bloody listen?"

"Shut it, Donovan," Lestrade said. "We actually have a real problem on our hands! John, what exactly happened in the pool? Did Sherlock give any indication that he was just stalling for time, or trying to find a weakness?"

"No. He was…well, he made it seem believable. To me, at least." John shrugged and had another sip. Lestrade and Donovan brushed off his silence as shock, but they couldn't tell the whirring electricity sparking through John's mind. He was sifting through each layer of his memory, dissecting and trying to be Sherlock so some of what Sherlock had said would suddenly make sense. There was no way in hell that what he'd seen had been real. There wasn't.

Even though Sherlock—

Even though…

Even though he'd said some very personal things, things that cut too close to the quick. Things that made John uncomfortable because they weren't just cruel…they were the tiniest bit true.

_Villains have it all too easy_, Sherlock had once said when they'd been watching a crap movie on the telly. _They never have to throw out random insults—that's too obvious. All they have to do is find one weakness, one little insecurity, and the hero's resolve is shattered._

Did that make John the hero? If that was how Sherlock felt about it, then maybe John could take the words he'd said at the pool and regard them as true acting, acting he was supposed to recognize. Even though Sherlock had chosen a strange insecurity to exploit, one he didn't want to think about Sherlock recognizing…

_You're just hopelessly in love with your flatmate and it kills you that you were wrong about yourself._

Sherlock was acting. He was pretending, probably to save everyone's skin even now. He wasn't a fool; he'd never join Moriarty willingly. There was a bigger game to all of this, one that Sherlock had seen and John was still struggling to picture.

And what he'd said…that was a lie, too. Even if it made John's chest constrict.

_You're hopelessly in love with your flatmate. Who betrayed you._

_Except he didn't. He was just protecting everyone. Protecting you._

"John? John? You okay, mate?" Lestrade said, breaking John's reverie. He jumped in his seat a bit and swiveled his gaze to Lestrade's tie.

"What?"

"You just seem a little…wired. Maybe you should go home for the night. We can handle everything from here."

"No, I'm really fine. I want to help," John said, setting his coffee cup on the desk. "What were we discussing?"

"Well, since Sherlock hasn't committed any crimes as such, we can't do anything to go after him, but we can send out a search warrant for James Moriarty and try and weed him out. Wherever he is, we might find Sherlock and set him straight before he does something stupid."

"If we can get to him in time," Donovan sneered, and for the first time that night at the Yard, John met her gaze head-on with a glare that made her shut her jaw.

"He's not going to do anything. He's coming back, and soon."

Lestrade coughed. "John, we don't exactly know what's going to happen here. It's better to try and find them before they hurt anyone instead of waiting to get hurt."

"He's not going to hurt anyone."

"John…"

"No, all right, I know him! I _know_ him!" John insisted. "I know you're all ready to dismiss him, because he's the Freak to you, but can't you all see what's going on? Sherlock's _playing the game_. He knows what a threat Moriarty is, and he put himself in danger in order to save our skins!"

"We can't possibly know that!"

"_I_ know it!" He felt himself shaking, even as he stood and pressed his knuckles into the desk. "I know that bloody man. He's two steps ahead of everyone else, and he saw that Moriarty would never stop, so he decided to fool him and become an inside man. In a few days Moriarty will be dead, Sherlock will be home, and everyone will be safe thanks to him. If you're too fucking daft to see that, then I almost feel sorry for this whole bloody place."

Donovan fumed from her corner. "You're wrong." With a turn on her heels, she opened the door of the office and walked out. "And you're going to see that soon."

The door slammed behind her, bouncing off the frame a few times before settling once more.

Lestrade massaged his temple. "John…"

"Lestrade, please. You know I'm right. You know _him_. Don't send out the search warrant just yet."

"The warrant's only for Moriarty—"

"If you send out that warrant, you implicate him before he has the chance to do what no one else can—kill that bastard before he can blow anyone else up."

Lestrade stared at John, who was still shaking with his certainty, and nodded once. "He gets 48 hours. But if anyone dies, Watson, it's on Sherlock's head. I've no idea why I'm even listening to you."

"You're not listening to me. You're listening to Sherlock, just like always. You're giving him the chance you always give him. If you get the Yard involved right away, you take away Sherlock's advantage." John sat down again. "We just have to give him a bit of time."

Lestrade fingered the edge of his desk, quiet for a moment. Finally, in a low voice, he said, "What's going to happen if you're wrong, mate? If he's really…crossed over, I mean."

"Not going to happen."

"You remember what he said—he's tired of playing by the rules. Coming from him, it's a valid complaint, and it's motive for joining Moriarty for real."

John shook her head fervently. "Sherlock would never do that. He said that no one believed in him, no one let him be who he was, except me. Well, most of the time—and I'm trying to make up for the times I didn't trust him to do the right thing. I trust him now, Greg."

Like clockwork, that's when the screen of Lestrade's computer flickered to life.


	3. Chapter 3

Lestrade blinked and tilted the screen toward him. "What the hell?" John watched from his chair, completely tense, while he batted at the computer a few times and its screen flashed a few times and showed streams of binary. "Bloody I.T., never gets the new models…"

The screen finally turned black for a few moments as Lestrade railed against it and then—_then_—the grinning face of an Irish madman appeared. "Evening, gents."

John blanched. "Lestrade. LESTRADE. Get on your phone, call the tech department, trace this feed,_NOW_."

"The fuck are you on about? Who is that? Is that—"

"Moriarty. _Fuck_." John swiveled the screen toward him. "He usually doesn't want to be seen. He makes his minions do all the work for him, I thought."

"Well, I hardly need to hide anymore, do I, Johnny-boy?" Moriarty asked form the computer. At John's aghast face at being heard, he merely smirked. "Web-cams. _Duh_."

"Donovan," Lestrade commanded in a low voice. "_Donovan_. Call the tech division, trace this feed, we need a location."

Moriarty merely chuckled and put his face in his hand, almost too entertained for words, as the entire floor of New Scotland Yard went dark. The lights faded to black and the floor went silent, tense with confusion.

John's breathing shallowed. He cleared his throat once, ignoring the sheen of panicked sweat that had just broken out over his forehead. Moriarty was showing himself. This showed a change in the game.

He had to be ready to play. It was time to be a soldier.

"Gregson Lestrade, is it?" Moriarty drawled from the screen. "Pleasure to finally meet, face to face. Well, face to screen. Like what I've done to the place?"

"I assuming you're the guy behind the sick games with Sherlock, then," Lestrade replied. He held on, white-knuckled, to the edge of his desk.

"Games? Oh, my dear, those weren't _games_. That was _flirtation_. Those were simply appetizers. I'm a romantic at heart, Gregson—I like to show my admiration, tease my partner a bit. A little theft here, a little tax fraud there." His grin continued to grow. "A sprinkle of murder. Only the best for someone as delicious as Sherly."

"Sherlock. Is he with you?" John asked, swiveling the screen to face him.

"Sherlock? No, he's not with me at the present."

John breathed a sigh of relief. So he'd been able to get away. To escape.

"He's actually setting up round one right now."

"Round one?" Lestrade asked. "Round one of what?"

Moriarty kept his gaze fixed on John. "We've been in the shadows too long, John Watson. Men like me, men like Sherlock. Great men, great minds limited to the simply ordinary. I've lived in the shadows for a long time, my dear. I've seen black things that your nightmares couldn't fathom, even the nightmares of a soldier. I've even facilitated them. _Someone _has to do it. But I don't need to be a prince of shadows. Not when I have the cleverness of a king." He leaned back, away from the camera, and crossed his arms. "It's time to crawl out of the darkness. I'm ready, John Watson. Sherlock is, too. Are you?"

John tightened his jaw. "What exactly are you planning?"

"A game. The very greatest game, like the one you and Sherlock played against me. This time we just switched the teams and raised the stakes. All of England thinks they're safe, thinks that people like us are under control. We're going to show them, show everyone, that they're not safe. Especially you, John." Jim sneered. "Now, I'm sorry, I am. I'm sorry it had to be you. But to be fair, you did choose Sherlock. Maybe if you'd left him alone, you wouldn't be involved. He and I could have shacked up earlier."

He nearly punched the screen then, but it was useless and he knew it, so he clenched his fists and tried to focus on breathing evenly. _Moriarty is only messing with you, _he told himself. _He only wants to see you squirm. Remember that Sherlock is on your side, he's working with you…to protect you._

"So, here's the deal, gents," announced Moriarty. "Your precious little pound of bloodhounds—New Scotland Yard—is currently in lockdown. Don't try and figure out how we did it, because really, we're two geniuses with inside information. It's not exactly _difficult_. You're all locked in, you're in the dark, and we're the ones who control what doors open and what tech works. No one gets out, only one man gets in—unless you manage to find a way to escape. Which I hope you do, since we decided it best to start this game…with a bang."

"One man gets in…" John repeated to himself before it clicked. He grabbed his gun and rushed to the door, which was locked of course. "Come on, Lestrade! We need to go!"

Lestrade followed as Moriarty cackled on the screen, a high, eerie sound that followed the two men down the hall after they threw their shoulders into the door and broke it down.

"It's a bomb," John explained as they ran down the dark hall, passing cubicles of murmuring, panicking workers. "Moriarty's planting a bomb somewhere in the building. He's getting Sherlock to do it."

"Fuck—_fuck_!" Lestrade cursed. "We need to get everyone out of here."

"We can't. Moriarty's controlling the doors, everything's locked."

"So we break open a window, call the fire department, get a fucking ladder or something! We need to EVACUATE, damn it!"

"Lestrade!" John snarled, stopping him in his tracks and holding him by the shoulders. "You don't know Moriarty. No one really does except Sherlock. But I met him, and he always has a million plans. He was going to kill me with a bomb, and if that didn't work, he had snipers hidden everywhere at that bloody pool. He'll have snipers waiting outside."

"That's bloody fucking bonkers."

"It's his definition of playing fair."

Lestrade nodded gravely. "So…we have to find this bomb…or we all die."

"The best detectives and police force in England, all gone. Moriarty is going after all of England, coming out of the shadows, like he said. He's going to tear the country apart."

"But Sherlock's planting the bomb. Maybe we can find him, reason with him. Maybe he's not even planting it at all—maybe you're right, he's on our side."

"Of _course_ I'm right!" John growled.

Donovan ran over, tottering in her heels, and shouted over her shoulder. "Everyone, SHUT IT! We're experiencing some technical difficulties, but stay in your seats while we sort it out! Lestrade," she said, addressing him in a lower voice, "what the hell is going on?"

"We're under attack. Bloody Moriarty's got a bomb in the building."

"What do we do?"

"Go looking for it. It's our only choice—he'll kill anyone who escapes. Keep everyone in their seats, don't let them panic, and text me with any updates." Lestrade pulled his gun out of his belt and charged down the hall with a blazing look of determination that made even John Watson stare after him, impressed. After a moment, he followed suit.

"So, Sherlock's in the building—an entrance only he has access to. I have the blueprints somewhere on file in the basement, if the stairs aren't locked," suggested Lestrade, but John shook his head.

"No, Sherlock found those blueprints ages ago—he said they weren't useful and he deleted them from his bloody mind palace. We'd need an entrance that Sherlock would have catalogued as useful, something with a flair, something clever…"

Lestrade frowned as they rounded a corner and threw open the door to the stairs. "Hang on—clever Sherlock may be, but he doesn't like to show off."

"Are you kidding me? That's _exactly _what he likes!"

"He shows off after he's succeeded. He'd never try to do something flashy before he knew he was going to succeed—there's too much room for error. No, to get into the building, he did something foolproof, something simple…" Lestrade ran with surprising speed down the steps as John followed. "He would have just used my bloody badge or something from the last time he nicked it. Walked in with a disguise, a good fake ID, he could have gotten in anywhere. He knows this building too well."

John looked incredulous. "That's actually brilliant."

"You're not the only one who knows Sherlock. I've been working with him for years. The question is, where did he go after he got in? He'd have to find a place no one knew well enough so he could plant the bomb."

John paused on the landing of the stairwell. "No. No, that's not it…" He blinked and concentrated on what he knew. "Moriarty is playing a game that's meant to do more than kill people. It's meant to hurt me—he thinks I'm the opponent to beat here. If he can get to me, he wins."

Lestrade braced himself against a wall to catch his breath. "So Sherlock's putting the bomb somewhere that will hurt you? Where the bloody hell could that be?"

"I dunno." John massaged his temple while urging his brain to think. Somewhere that would hurt him…somewhere _meaningful_. And he had to consider that Sherlock was still playing on their side. He would make it easy for John to find him, if John knew where to look. He'd pick somewhere John wouldn't forget, somewhere that John would look back on that no one else would know.

_There was the time we hid in the supply closet to listen in on Anderson trying to explain why he was working so closely with Donovan to his wife. I laughed for ages in there when his bony knees weren't poking me in the sodding chest._

_The evidence room. We spent hours in there._

_Lestrade's office? No, we were just there._

_Come on, Watson—what would Sherlock assume was memorable to you? What would he think you'd remember? What would you be proud of?_

_Oh. OH._

"I know where to go," he announced, pulling Lestrade along. "Basement filing room near the interrogation rooms. He'd go there. He's there now, I know it."

"How do you know that?"

"I _know_, all right? I just do. Come on!"

The pair rushed down the stairs as the lights flickered all around, some going dark, some buzzing eerily on as they thundered past.


	4. Chapter 4

_"The coffee is better down here," Sherlock said confidentially, brewing some from the pot behind the ancient computer. "The people who work here have the most tedious jobs at the Yard, so they try and get back at everyone by having the best coffee."_

_John looked at all the boxes of files around him and nodded. "Must be pretty bloody awful down here. You sure they won't mind us stealing their special coffee or anything?"_

_"No. There are only two workers down here—Jeanette and Roland. They go have a shag in the copy room for a half hour this time every day. The coffee is ours." Sherlock offered him a cup with a smirk, which John took gratefully (the smirk and the coffee)._

_Sherlock stretched himself out on the nearest chair, breathing in the scent of his coffee. "I would have made tea, but I would have had to actually go find a kettle and this is so much easier. Besides, we've had a long day and coffee is needed."_

_"Long day indeed. I really have to hand it to you," John said, toasting Sherlock with his foam cup. "It looked damn near impossible for a while. But you solved it, like you solve everything."_

_Sherlock smiled briefly and shook his head. "This was a 4 at most. The whole thing was just a bit of a bureaucratic mess, that's why it took so long."_

_"Right. Because everything is easy for you."_

_"Not everything." He looked uncomfortable for a moment. "Not…things."_

_"Things?"_

_"Things."_

_"Bloody hell, don't just come out and tell me, please be as vague as possible."_

_"Being nice. Being good…to people. Like thanking the waiters for bringing water and apologizing for pushing people off stairs." Sherlock glared at his foam cup and took a somewhat angry sip. "I might have misjudged this coffee."_

_"Oh, it's not bad," John offered, but Sherlock had made up his mind against it. Setting the cup on the desk, he wrapped his arms around his knees and fumed._

_"That case took too long. I'm losing my touch," he seethed._

_John rolled his eyes. "You just said it was a 4 at most—"_

_"I was covering up to save my arse, John! I took far too long in solving that, and people could have died as a result. I've never taken more than a week in solving a case, and those are only the involved ones."_

_"Wait, are you having a strop because people were in danger or because your timing was off."_

_"Does it _matter_?"_

_"It should."_

_He grumbled and didn't say anything for a while. Finally: "I was right. You're really excellent at those things."_

_"Again, you're going to have to clarify…"_

_"Morality things." Sherlock dropped his fuming for a moment and smiled thoughtfully. "Mycroft tells me you're my portable moral compass. I don't know if that's a compliment to you or a veiled insult to me."_

_"Knowing Mycroft," John said, "it's probably both. But I wouldn't listen to that sod. You've got a moral compass, Sherlock. I've seen you use it."_

_Sherlock looked up at John a little timidly before clearing his throat and resuming his usual mask of cool indifference. "Is that right?" he scoffed._

_"Ye-pp." John smacked the 'p' a bit obnoxiously with a smirk. "Come on, Sherlock, you did a good job today. You saved the Carter family, you found the embezzler, and it's pad thai night at the Lonely Dragon. And the coffee is good, just like you said. You're getting yourself worked up."_

_"I don't get 'worked up'!"_

_"You do, nearly daily, so sod off, you. It hasn't scared me off yet."_

_Sherlock eyed him questioningly, but then something seemed to click in his head. "No. No, I rather think you never will."_

_"Will what?"_

_"Be scared off. Run away." He leaned forward and steepled his fingers. "You're not the type."_

_"No deducing me, we have a rule about this…" John argued, but Sherlock was on a roll._

_"You haven't left me yet. I thought you stayed for the adrenaline rush, but you've stayed even through slow periods and fits and starts. You stay for my companionship."_

_"Isn't that obvious?"_

_"Why?" Sherlock frowned, looking genuinely confused._

_John only sighed and said, "Brilliant Sherlock Holmes. You can't figure that out?"_

_He raised an eyebrow. "Ah."_

_"What?" John squirmed in his seat as Sherlock leaned back in his chair with what only could be classified as a chuckle. "What?"_

_"So that's how you feel."_

_"Hang on—what? N-no—no, Sherlock, not that."_

_"Isn't it?"_

_"Whatever happened to 'married to your work'?"_

_"So you're not denying it?"_

_"I'm not—what exactly are you implying?"_

_"Nothing, John." John opened his mouth to protest, but Sherlock waved his arguments away and said, "Forget it. Forget I said anything. It's been a trying case."_

_"Er…right." John finished the cup of coffee and sat in sticky silence, waiting for Sherlock to say something. When it was obvious that Sherlock was done talking, John leaned forward and said, "Listen…you're my best mate. I don't know how you did it, but you're my best friend and I can't see myself leaving 221B, whether we're working on a case or waiting for one. I can't see myself—sod it—leaving YOU at any point in my life. I owe you too much."_

_"You owe me nothing."_

_"You really don't get it, do you? Have you any idea how lonely and depressed I was after the war? You…you bloody well saved me, in your own way. I don't know what I'd have done, or where I'd be, without you. I owe you a debt, Sherlock, and I'm staying with you."_

_"I don't deserve it."_

_"Shut up," John said affectionately. "You berk. Someone's got to believe in you."_

_"And you think that person should be you," Sherlock replied._

_"It _is _me."_

_The silence settled back in again, with Sherlock staring vacantly at a file cabinet behind John. John waited patiently for Sherlock to respond, but when it seemed hopeless, he picked up his coat and made for the door. "I'll see you at home."_

_"I wouldn't leave you, either."_

_John stopped. "What?"_

_"I said I wouldn't leave you. It's not like you really offer me the excitement I offer you in our relationship…"_

_"Oh, shut up."_

_"…but you're my moral compass. And my best friend, too. So."_

_"So."_

_"So thank you."_

_John stared incredulously at Sherlock, who had just said the most caring, friendly thing he'd ever said in their time together as flatmates but looked like he'd commented on the weather or something equally unrelated. He stared a second longer, feeling tight in his stomach for reasons he couldn't fathom, nodded, and left._

"Basement file room? Roland and Jeanette work down there—you don't think he's killed them, do you?" Lestrade asked as they fled down the stairs and made it to the first level lobby door.

John tried the door—locked. The pair threw their shoulders into it a few times and managed to knock it down. "Sherlock hasn't killed anyone, all right? How many times do I have to tell you, he's playing the game here with us? Who's the say the bomb is even real?"

"Moriarty?"

"Maybe Sherlock's snipped the right wires for us already. We have to give him the benefit of the doubt."

Lestrade followed him close behind as the flew across the lobby and to the basement door. "I think you have to be ready in case Sherlock's really on the other side. If he has a gun to someone's head, if he's ready to blow up this building and hundreds of people—me—_you_—"

"Lestrade. STOP. If we think that way, we lose already." Down they went to the basement, and they slowed as their eyes scanned damp supply closets and empty conference rooms and cabinets of stray files until they arrived at the main basement file room.

Lestrade held his gun close to his chest and looked at John, who kept his gun by his leg, hidden near his pocket. They counted silently to three, and on reaching it, John turned the doorknob and they burst in.

Everything looked the same as it had when John had last been there. The files were dusty and a bit dank, the cabinets were a drab olive color, and boxes of case information littered the ground.

The coffee machine was humming on the desk, heating up near a stack of Styrofoam cups. With his feet propped up on the desk and his hands folded neatly across his chest, Sherlock glanced up at Lestrade and John.

He smiled. "Coffee?"


	5. Chapter 5

John wasn't sure whether to aim his gun straight at Sherlock's curly head or drop it and run to him, pummeling him with hugs and high-grade swear words. He settled for staring, a bit dumbfounded, at his ex-flatmate. He'd seen him only about six hours before, but with all the changes, all the confusion, it seemed like it had been weeks or months.

Sherlock frowned. "I'll take that as a no. Bit awkward, that. Makes things a bit more barbaric."

"Sherlock Holmes," began Lestrade slowly, "what the fuck is this all about, then?"

"You're not going to make me explain it to you, are you?" Sherlock drawled. "I thought Johnny would have done at least an adequate job. He's the one with a flair for verbal dramatics."

John clenched his teeth at that new, Moriarty-based nickname, about to argue until Lestrade cut him off.

"Moriarty's enlisted you in his game. You're here to drop off a gift for us Yarders," Lestrade said in a straight, unwavering tone. "You're going to blow us all up, is that it?"

"Obviously."

"Oh, come on, Sherlock, that is _cheap_! You're a bloody genius! You're better than being one of Moriarty's henchman."

Sherlock flicked a piece of lint off his suit jacket. "As if I'd ever stoop to being a henchman. We're partners."

"What, does he have some camera on you now? Some microphone?" Lestrade asked. "Sherlock, we know you're not serious. You're just playing the game, we get it. Tell us where the bomb is, we can get rid of it, and you can tell us what you need us to do to help you take Moriarty down. Enough theatrics."

Sherlock smiled. "You really don't think… Oh, that's good. That's _excellent_. You think I'm pretending?" He clapped his hands together and pressed them to his lips. "I should win the Olivier, shouldn't I? Best performance in a leading role in a government takeover? What'll the critics be spouting next?"

"Sherlock," John said, "enough."

His eyes flickered to John's, holding his gaze for a brief instant. Then he flexed his fingers and began to speak again. "Let me explain something very quickly, since as you know, I don't have a lot of time. We're all on a bit of schedule, aren't we? There is no secret plan, Lestrade. There is no double agent work. I've realigned my sympathies and we've begun the game again. This time I'm not going to be on the losing side."

"The bomb—"

"The bomb, admittedly, is a bit too predictable for my taste, but Jim insisted it would send the right message for our purposes and I'm inclined to oblige him for the time being. The bomb is real, the bomb is in this room, and the bomb will go off in about, oh…" Sherlock tapped his chin. "Two minutes. Give or take."

"Fucking _hell_!" Lestrade got to work on the room, tearing apart filing cabinets. "Are you _FUCKING INSANE_?! We're all going to die if you don't help us."

"No one is dying today," Sherlock said, sounding bored. He pointed to the L-N cabinet. "It's in there, third drawer from the top."

John let some of the gathering tension in his body leave, once again reaffirming Sherlock's common sense. Sherlock wouldn't kill anyone. No one was going to die today.

"Go on, then," Sherlock instructed as Lestrade carefully open the door and extricated the complicated package, wired and packed with canvas and wrapped stick of explosives. "Run. Get it out of here. No, wait."

Lestrade stared at him incredulously for a moment. Sherlock rose to his feet and walked up to Lestrade, only the bomb between them. "This is only the first part, Lestrade. It's a warning of what's coming. No one is meant to die today—not at all. The only thing you'll be today is sufficiently taught how easily your lives lie in my hands. _Our _hands. The point is to terrify you." He tilted his head to the side. "Good luck disposing of it. The front doors are unlocked now. I look forward to round two."

Greg swallowed hard, and any trace John had seen of Lestrade's faith in Sherlock vanished from his eyes in seconds. "If you're not for us, Sherlock, you're against us."

"That's the point. _Go_."

Lestrade ran out the door to get rid of the bomb. John could only guess what he was going to do with it and prayed that it wouldn't involve Lestrade's own death, and despite the terror of the situation and utter absurdity of it all, John Watson laughed.

Once he started, he couldn't stop. He bent over, holding his side from all the laughter erupting from him, because Sherlock was so—utterly—_absurd._

"All right," he wheezed, "that was good. I'll give you that, _that_ was fucking hilarious. I owe you a pint for that one, because you were very, very good. But it was a little too stereotypical for me, mate. I thought you were going to grow a mustache or goatee just to stroke it menacingly or something." He straightened up. "Seriously, though. How long did the bomb take you? It must have been pretty damn good if it fooled Moriarty."

Sherlock only eyed him from across the filing cabinets.

"I'm guessing the explosives are real, but they're not wired to the timer, is that it? It should be real, but it's not quite finished yet—or maybe the wires are just rubber. You did that before, for the Quallington case. Sherlock?"

"Why do you think I made a fake bomb?"

"Because—well, bloody hell, of course it was fake. Of course it was."

"John."

"Sherlock, you're not actually doing this. You really aren't. You can fool Lestrade, and maybe that's even part of the plan, but I _know _you, Sherlock Holmes. You wouldn't endanger the lives of so many people."

Sherlock's stony glare said otherwise. John's resolve faltered.

"All right, maybe the bomb was real. Maybe you didn't have the means to fake one, maybe Moriarty's guarding you too closely. Maybe. But you can tell me, mate."

Sherlock continued to stare until, after a long moment, he let out a bone-rattling chuckle. "Loyal to the last, John Watson. I had rather hoped you would be. Exactly _what_," he said, taking slow steps forward, "is it going to take to get me to convince you that I'm not pulling the wool over anyone's eyes?"

"Why do you have to convince me of anything?"

"Because I'm _bored_!" he exclaimed. "Because I don't want to be indulged by you, like I'm some child. Wake _up_, John, this isn't playing pretend. We're not in nursery school, we're at war, and we're on very different sides now. You're a soldier. Understand that I am no long your ally."

"We're friends, Sherlock. You don't just forget friendship."

"No, that's not your problem." He smirked. "You feel slighted. I chose another boy, a prettier boy. Don't tell me Three-Continents Watson is jealous of James Moriarty."

He clenched his fists. "How many times do I have to tell you that this isn't about romance?"

"How many times do I have to tell _you_ that I'm your enemy now?" Sherlock shook his head. "It's completely about romance. It's me. It's the romanticized idea you have of me as a hero, as a friend. It's another one of your boxes you want to put me in without my consent. You're making me a _dog_, a_thing_ you have to train to be nice. An animal on a _leash_. I don't take kindly to being on a leash, John." He smirked again. "Well, Jim's leash might be a different matter. He took the liberty of showing me some of his toys, Johnny, and even _you'd_ be impressed."

"Stop this," John growled. "Stop this NOW."

"Jealous."

"_Twat_."

"_There_," Sherlock said, suddenly moving forward and pinning John to the cabinet behind him, "is the emotion I've been looking for."

And suddenly Sherlock's lips were on John's, crashing to his painfully and unfairly. John nearly jumped out of his skin and tried to push Sherlock off, but Sherlock's arm was right against his collarbone and he couldn't shift his weight.

Some small part of him, the tiniest scrap of unsullied emotion in his brain untouched by the drama of the last 24 hours, was relieved. On some level, this was all John had wanted to happen since the pool a few hours ago, without his conscious mind ever even knowing about it. Suddenly Sherlock's lips were there and they were hard and bruising, and John should have focused on anything else, especially how _wrong _it was, but he couldn't.

Sherlock was rough, imprecise and unforgiving and a little inexperienced, and after a harsh bite on John's bottom lip, he thought he could taste blood, but somehow that was good.

And there was no better idea in the world than letting himself get snogged by his traitor flatmate in the basement file room. John let the tension drop from his hands and shoulders and gave in, resolving to stop the kiss in a moment, or perhaps to move his hands to Sherlock's shoulder and face and take a bit of control himself.

It didn't seem like Sherlock was going to let that happen; he dragged his hands irresistibly down John's ribs and grabbed him by the hips, forcing him backward until John felt his back hit a heating pipe. He didn't care for a moment, because he'd forgotten how utterly strange this was. On some level, this was normal, this was what they'd been heading toward since they'd met.

_Click_. John opened his eyes with a start, staring confused into Sherlock's triumphant blue eyes.

"Emotion," Sherlock clarified softly, brushing his nose against John's, "is distraction. It's weakness. Remember that the next time we play. And I _do _hope we play a bit harder." He punctuated this with one more kiss and then pulled away, grabbing his long coat off the chair and a Styrofoam cup of coffee.

John tried to follow after him only to get pulled back, and he looked down to see his left arm handcuffed to the heating pipe. "Fuck. Did you seriously—_fuck_. You did NOT do this." He yanked his arms against the pipe, but it wouldn't give. Sherlock only continued to leave until John bellowed, "SHERLOCK!"

He paused in the doorway. "I'm not your friend, John. I'm not your lover either, no matter how much you wish that. Understand me when I say you are in danger of losing more than your life if you persist in the belief that you are special to me. You're not. You're just the only person who knows enough about the way I work to work against me."

"You—you bloody _fucking bastard_. You're not doing this, you're _not_—" John reached for his phone to call someone with his free hand, but his pockets were empty.

Sherlock sighed and tossed John's from out of his own pocket across the floor, two feet from John's reach. "Til the next time, Johnny."


	6. Chapter 6

"Well, I don't believe it," Mrs. Hudson pronounced good-naturedly, pouring John a cup of Earl Grey. "The Sherlock I know would never put anyone in danger like that, not his friends. And handcuffing you to that pipe? How did you let him do that, John? I thought you were a _bit_ more attentive than that."

John, massaging his still-sore wrist, didn't answer. He gratefully accepted the cup with a nod, sipped it, and thanked his lucky stars Mrs. Hudson didn't really suspect anything. He'd neglected to mention the furious snog that had distracted him from the handcuffs at the time.

"Anyway, is there any way Sherlock could still be on our side? You know this Moriarty chap—maybe Sherlock's taking him down."

"That's what I thought."

"Don't you think that anymore, dear?"

"I—yes." John had been asking himself that question for days now, since the bomb at the Yard a week ago. He sighed. "I do, Mrs. Hudson. He's playing a cruel game, but he has to get me to believe that he's switched. I think he's trying to keep us safe, and if he can convince me that he's…evil…then he doesn't have to worry about us anymore."

She nodded and sipped some of her own tea. "I believe that. He and this chap are supposedly planning another surprise, aren't they? Maybe when you go up against them, you could make his job a little easier? Pretend to hate him, for his sake?"

"Right, yeah. Definitely can do that."

Mrs. Hudson missed the sarcasm and smiled. "Maybe you should call Mycroft," she suggested. "Perhaps he has some insight into this plot. Mycroft seems to know everything."

For some reason, that thought hadn't struck John yet. He felt like a dolt for not realizing that he could count on Mycroft as an ally—a curmudgeonly supporter, but a supporter nonetheless. "That's actually brilliant, thanks," he said. "I was going to visit Greg in a few. Maybe we can call him from the hospital."

"That would be best, dear." She made a contented sound and folded her hands over John's. "Point is, John, you two always solve things when you get in a tiff."

"Fake-realigning loyalties with a madman and injuring one of his best mates with a bomb isn't exactly a tiff, Mrs. Hudson."

"Whatever you want to call it. Though I will have to yell at him quite a bit for hurting Greg. Such a nice boy…"

John hid his eye-roll, thanked Mrs. Hudson for the tea and brilliant idea, grabbed his coat, and left the flat to hail a cab to St. Bart's. Lestrade had been there for the past week—he'd managed to get the bomb outside and run to Christchurch Gardens, and with only seconds left, he'd screamed everyone as far away as he could get them. The bomb had gone off and torn up the park, injuring the people who were close but not killing anyone. However, Lestrade had gotten caught in the tail end of the blast and been burned badly on his right leg. He'd been in surgery the day after, getting skin grafts, and he'd complained the whole way through his healing. John had made the dutiful pilgrimage to his bedside every day since.

Lestrade had no sympathy for Sherlock. Not even the smallest bit of belief in him. They'd had many bedside arguments that John stopped for Lestrade's health. The doctors predicted a full recovery for him, and he intended to get back to the Yard as soon as they released him, to get on the case of catching Moriarty and Sherlock.

As the cab zoomed along through London traffic, John rested his head against the window and tried, as he'd done for days, to pry the cruelty of Sherlock's actions from his own emotions related to the kiss. He tried to emulate Sherlock—the Sherlock he _knew_, the one he loved, if loved was the right word, which he didn't know—and look at facts.

The kiss—it was meant for distraction. Distracting him from the handcuffs, giving Sherlock a chance to escape. Admittedly one of the oldest tricks in the book, one that John should have recognized, but now he realized its effectiveness. The kiss, passionate and burning and bruising, had completely caught him off guard.

And it had been building up for so long that John had given up and given in to it, and that's why he'd been cuffed to the pipe, banging the metal against it to make enough noise to get someone to find and free him.

But the kiss—it wouldn't have been good if it had been meaningless. How great of an actor was Sherlock, anyway? Or was the kiss a clue—Sherlock certainly didn't have to kiss him to trap him. Maybe that was the real Sherlock, the one underneath it all, sending John a message.

Or maybe it was just an especially cruel way to taunt him, to make John as angry as possible and leave him frustrated and alone. The cocktease.

He really didn't know what to think anymore. He didn't know if Mrs. Hudson was right—should he play dumb about Sherlock and pretend to fight against him?

He didn't want to. He wanted to prove Sherlock wrong, if he could. He wanted to prove Sherlock wrong and show that he believed in him, no matter what. Lestrade had his reasons for working against him now, but all he'd done to John was kiss him. If anything, that gave him a reason to want to believe him.

The cab pulled up and he stepped out, taking a breath to ready himself for a whining Lestrade. People were calling him a hero, and rightly so—he'd saved hundreds of lives. But they were mates, and Lestrade let loose all his cursing and complaining about the itchiness of the skin grafts with John around because he knew John would keep it in good confidence. John took it all in good stride.

Today, however, as he took the elevator and entered Lestrade's hospital room, he wasn't alone in his visit.

"Hello," Molly Hooper said cheerily, giving him a little wave from her chair by Lestrade's cot. "Nice to see you, John. How've you been?"

"Brilliant," he said automatically. "Er, hi, Molly. What are you doing here?"

"She's bringing some much needed brightness 'round here," Lestrade replied, manfully crossing his arms. "Hi, mate. How's Mrs. Hudson?"

"Sunny as ever. Maybe I should bring her 'round to see you…though Molly's prettier, I suppose," he amended. Molly blushed. "Anyway, she actually gave me a good idea. Have you called Mycroft yet?"

Lestrade frowned. "No, actually. I haven't. Why, should we use his security cameras? That isn't a bad plan, actually."

"What—er, no, I was thinking of calling and seeing if Sherlock's talked to him at all."

"Come on, mate, we've _talked _about this. I'm not doing any secret ninja work for that bastard. Maybe you think he's really doing the right thing, but that fucker nearly killed us all. I wouldn't be here if he hadn't been such a twat."

John set his jaw and nodded. "You're right, we've talked about it. But whatever you and I believe, maybe Mycroft can help in some way."

"He certainly won't be able to talk any sense into him," Lestrade argued.

"Probably. But Mycroft's Mycroft, mate. He'll have something for us."

Molly nodded. "Maybe Mycroft's already on the case for us. He'd have the sources for it, wouldn't he?"

"Exactly. If I know Sherlock Holmes, he's two steps ahead…"

Lestrade cleared his throat.

"…and his brother is five steps ahead." John pulled out his phone and dialed the number.

He answered on the second ring. "Afternoon, Dr. Watson. It's been quite a week, I hear."

"Hi, er, Mycroft…" John coughed and put his phone on speaker. "We're in a big group here at the hospital—Molly Hooper, Lestrade, and me. We wanted…well, we wanted to discuss the Sherlock situation."

"Hmm. I'm surprised it's taken you so long to think to call. It was only a matter of time, I suppose."

"Listen, we were wondering if he'd contacted you since…since he joined Moriarty. If he let you know anything about his plan or threatened you or whatever," he trailed off.

Mycroft chuckled on the other end. "That would make things easier, wouldn't it?"

"So, what? You haven't?" Lestrade said.

"He hasn't contacted me. No."

John's heart fell in his chest. "Have you tried keeping tabs on him?"

"To be honest, Dr. Watson, I've seen this coming from my brother for years. I'm surprised he's taken so long to cross over to the _dark side_," he said drily.

"And you're not worried about him?" asked Molly. "If it were my brother, I'd be sick with worry."

"No. His brain, Miss Hooper, is a busy thing. Overwhelmed with possibility, it shuts down. I suspect he will crash and burn soon, and when he does I will apprehend and rehabilitate him."

"That's it?" John asked incredulously. "You're not trying to find him."

"He doesn't want to be found. I'm sure if I looked for him, I'd find him quite simply. But in the middle of what, exactly? I'd probably see him doing something I can't see, in my minor position in the British government. It would require me to do something nasty, like arrest him. Or worse."

"You're letting your _fucking job_ keep you from saving your brother?"

"The only thing," Mycroft said in a clipped tone, "that my brother needs saving from is himself. I suggest you take a holiday, the three of you, somewhere out of the country for a few weeks. Let Sherlock and Moriarty play their little game until Sherlock breaks, and I'll pick him up when it happens. Oh, and John?" He could practically hear Mycroft's lips curl in a sneer. "I'll be sure to let you know when you can visit him."

"Mycroft, enough!" Lestrade said. "That's not fair. Don't be an arse to John about it, he's upset—as upset as you should be, actually, knowing that your brother almost killed London's finest!"

"My apologies. John, I think I should tell you—"

His phone beeped urgently, and John said, "Hold on, Mycroft, I have another call. Let me get back to you." He hit SEND and brought the phone back to his hear, off speaker. "Hello?"

"John? Is that you? It's Donovan."

"Hullo, Donovan," he said, confused. Lestrade had explained that Donovan was managing the department in his absence, but he hadn't been expecting a call. "Er, is there a problem?"

"Yeah, actually. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I need your helping. Your, erm, sleuthing help. There's been a robbery."

"I thought that wasn't your division."

"It's not. But it's…well, it's Sherlock and Moriarty. I need your expertise."

"A robbery? What exactly did they rob?"

"Bank of England. 750 million quid."

"…Fuck."

"Will you come?"

"I'm on my way."


	7. Chapter 7

The inside of a high-security vault in the Bank of England was not as interesting as John had always assumed it was. It was basically just a room with metal walls. A very empty-looking room, at this point.

"Er…" he mumbled. "I really can't help you figure out how they took all this money. This isn't all the money in England, is it? Because that would be really, _really _bad."

"No, no, don't worry about it," Donovan said. "We'd be in quite a state if this were really all the money in the country. No, it's just one room, but it's a significant sum and we'd very much like it back. There's no security feed, no fingerprints—it's like a ghost took it all. We've got our best teams working on figuring that out."

"So why am I here?"

"Sherlock. Obviously."

John looked at the bare vault around them. "I'm not the detective here, so I don't know how we know Sherlock was behind this."

"Well, that's the thing. He left you a message, I think."

"A message? Where, exactly?"

"All over the room." She sighed and crossed her arms. "He…well, he put your DNA all over the place. This entire vault is spotless except for a few hair samples from you."

John sighed and put his face in his hands. "Donovan, I have an alibi. I did not steal 750 million fucking quid."

"I know, John. That's why you're here—you need to tell me why Sherlock is trying to frame you. Especially if it's so obvious you didn't do this—no offense."

"None taken. All right, so…what? I'm trying to guess Sherlock's moves?"

"If you can."

John crossed his arms and scanned the room. He wasn't good at this. It wasn't his job to deduce, to observe, to make sense of things that by all rights was completely confusing.

He could do this. He was the only one who had a chance of beating Sherlock and Moriarty, at this point. It was his responsibility.

All right. So what did he know?

"Sherlock and Moriarty targeted New Scotland Yard first. They planted the bomb, but Sherlock told us that it was only a scare tactic to make us fear them and take them seriously."

"Right."

"So…" John continued. "So. Next, they steal 750 million quid from Bank of England, but they don't steal everything. They could have if they wanted to, but they didn't."

"Maybe they didn't have enough room in a van to take all the money?" Donovan suggested, but John only rolled his eyes.

"Transportation wouldn't have been the problem. Moriarty could have ten limousines outside if he'd needed the money. Besides, he's rich. He doesn't need the money—oh. _Oh_."

"What?"

John smiled triumphantly. "That's it. Moriarty doesn't need the money. Sherlock wouldn't want it. So why did they take it?"

Donovan furrowed her brow and thought about it. "Another scare tactic?"

"Exactly. Moriarty said that it was time to make all of England fear him. 'Out of the shadows,' he said. Where does he target first? The police force—they're trying to prove that even the police can't keep everyone safe. Now they're showing the money isn't safe."

"And why are you the target? Why are they trying to incriminate you if you clearly didn't steal the money?"

"Because…I'm the enemy. At least, they see me that way. Sherlock knows I know the way he works and I think they want to frighten me, too. To them, I'm the one thing keeping them from dominating all of England." He shook his head. "They really think too much of me. I'm nowhere near their level of intelligence. I'm just a normal bloke."

"Maybe that's not it. No offense, Watson, but they know you're not on their par, brain-wise. Maybe the reason they see you as an enemy is because you're the one weakness they've got."

"No…that's not it. Is it?" John asked. "How am I a weakness?"

Donovan rolled her eyes. "You really are thick. Sherlock, you numpty. No matter what Moriarty gets Sherlock to do, the one thing Sherlock would refuse to do is hurt you."

"He locked me in the basement and chained me to a pipe!"

"That's all he could do, John! He's a freak, but he couldn't stand the idea of actually hurting you. So he put on a show so Moriarty would believe he's against you."

"You think Sherlock's on our side still?" John asked hopefully.

Donovan snorted. "No. But I think you're his exception. Sherlock probably agrees with everything this Moriarty bloke says unless it's something that will hurt you, and then he has to lie. You're probably going to want to be careful, in case he tries to kidnap you and hide you in his evil castle or something."

It wasn't exactly the most comforting of sentiments, but for some reason, it made John feel relieved. Maybe Moriarty and Sherlock saw him as an intellectual threat. Maybe they saw him as just as much of an emotional distraction to Sherlock as Sherlock was to John. Either way, there was hope. There was something that Sherlock could be counted on for.

John smiled and headed out the vault door. "I'll call you in the morning if I come up with any new developments."

"Same here."

John left Bank of England feeling rejuvenated and lifted. For all of Donovan's snark, she actually had moments of clarity. John wasn't the enemy so much as the weakness to their game. They were trying to eliminate him before he caused too much trouble for Sherlock.

That was something he could play with. The thing that would make Moriarty lose his grip on things would be to infuriate him over John's relationship with Sherlock. It could exacerbate him to the point of losing the upper hand.

John called Lestrade and told him everything. Lestrade was even more on edge in his hospital bed, angry that he couldn't get up and investigate, but Molly seemed to be doing a good job of relaxing him.

Jovial all the way back to his flat, John took the steps two at a time and fumbled with his keys, eager to get back to his computer and do some more research. On opening his door, a huge fluttering of paper toppled over him and floated down to the stair landing. Confused, he picked up one of the papers that had stuck to the static of his jumper.

It was a 100 pound note. They all were.

Panicking, he picked up as much of the notes as he could and shoved them back into 221B, but it was useless. John's jaw dropped open in mute horror.

Stacked on every available surface in the flat was money. 1,000 quid on his armchair. 5,000 quid on the mantle next to the skull. Piles of it, seven feet high.

John guessed, if he counted it all, it would be about 750 million quid.

He breathed out, completely floored. "Fuck."

"Eloquent as always," a deep voice said from somewhere behind the stacks, "though I was hoping I'd get something a bit more dramatic. You're too British, John."

"Sherlock. Bit immature, this," John said, trying to swallow the shock from his voice. "Even for you."

"Cute. Cheap insults. Definitely effective," Sherlock said with a smirk, walking out from behind a pile of what must have been 10 million quid that grazed the ceiling. He crossed his arms. "It's nice to be back home. Like what I've done with the place?"

John could have punched him or done something equally aggressive, but he just laughed. This was all just too bizarre, and he knew what he was to Sherlock at this point. All this was bravado. "Sherlock, really, what's this all about? I have an alibi—no one's going to believe I took this."

"Oh, I know. I needed the storage space and I thought you'd be amenable."

"This'll get me taken down to the station. I'll have to fill out paperwork, I might even need bail, just for possessing all this stolen money."

"I'd bail you out."

"Would you really?"

"No."

John smirked. "I always bailed you out. When you were a stupid sod and landed yourself in jail."

"If you're trying to appeal to my sensitivity, best leave it for Mrs. Hudson. You know me too well to know it's not going to work with me."

"Exactly. I'm not appealing to anything, Sherlock. It's just you and me, alone, surrounded by a metric shit-ton of stolen money from the Bank of England. Just tell me—what's really going on here?"

"I think it's quite obvious. We're playing the game."

"Is this a winning move? The charges won't stick. I didn't steal the money."

"I know."

"So why do it?"

"How do the kids put it? We're _messing _with you."

John smirked, crossed his arms, and shook his head. "No. No, that might be it, but something doesn't make sense."

"What?"

"Why are you _here_, Sherlock?" John asked. "You could have just left the money and the message would have been the same, yet you felt the need to deliver it. What, are you here to hurt me? To kill me?"

Sherlock only stared at him across the room, betraying nothing.

"That's just it. You can't. Maybe it's because it would ruin your fun. Or maybe," John said, feeling his confidence grow as he crossed the room to face Sherlock, "you can't stand the idea of hurting me any more than I can stand the idea of you really teaming up with Moriarty."

Up close, he could see that Sherlock was practically vibrating with anger, and then he did something very unexpected again—he seized John's face with his hands and leaned in to kiss him.

John held a finger in between their lips and laughed. "Not fooling me with that one again, mate."

Sherlock, not letting going of John's face, licked his lips and pulled away an inch. "Yes. I can see that. Very interesting."

"What is?"

"Your level of faith. Inhuman, some might say."

"Some might say it's the only real weapon I have against you. If I really need a weapon, that is. Which remains to be seen." John paused. "Sherlock, you've got to tell me. I've been going mad wondering—are you just trying to gain Moriarty's trust? If you are, tell me and I'll play the game with you. We can do this _together_."

"You're a horrid actor."

"I'm not."

Sherlock chuckled and released John. "I suppose that would be easier, wouldn't it?"

"If this were all a lie? Of course it would. But I'd never let you hear the end of it. No more body parts in the fridge, for real this time. You'd owe me big." John sighed. "You put Lestrade in the hospital, Sherlock. You don't feel the slightest bit bad about that?"

"Should I?"

"Never mind. Just how far are you willing to go, here? You wouldn't kill anyone, really."

"If that helps you sleep at night."

"Enough being so fucking _cryptic_, Sherlock, there are lives at stake! Lives that you yourself might take, lives that might belong to your friends. Could you really imagine yourself killing Molly Hooper, or Mrs. Hudson? Me?"

"I've already hurt you."

"Oh, yeah, cuffed me to a pipe in a basement. Really painful, that. I suffered all week."

"Don't be blasé, John, you know it annoys me." Sherlock said. "Clearly this has been a waste of my time. Jim will be needing me to plan phase three—you've figured it out by now, then, what we're doing?"

"Dominating England piece by piece. Police, then money…do I get a clue of what's next?" John joked.

"This isn't Cluedo on a Saturday night when you're too bored to go to the pub and pick up disgusting women, John, this—this is—" Sherlock stopped abruptly. "The police will be here with a warrant in less than fifteen minutes. You can try and run but that will definitely only increase the paperwork."

"So, what? I spend the night in jail for you? Is that really the best you can do?"

"No, John. I really can do so, _so_ much better." Sherlock turned on his heel and made to leave, right out the front door, before he added, "Do you know why I came here? Honestly?"

"No."

"I wanted to see what you looked like when you didn't hate me, one last time. File it away in the mind palace."

"What makes you think," John said warily, "that I would ever hate you?"

Sherlock smiled. "I'm making a bet on how long your faith will last. I can guarantee it won't extend beyond the next time we meet."

"What are you going to do? Sherlock, what are you planning? Sherlock!"

But he'd already left, and John could have sworn the man was more air than flesh—he ran after him to get an answer and Sherlock was already gone.


	8. Chapter 8

**Hi, lovely readers. I'm really sorry about this-I'm not from England and I am not of Sherlock's intellect or intent, so I am bad coming up with cases. Also with locations in London or any sort of London geography. I have no brit-picker or beta, so I'm flying in the blind.**

**But I sincerely hope that my English readers, if I have any, will forgive and not mind it, or possibly give me some pointers if I got anything wrong, location-wise.**

**Anyway, enjoy :).**

* * *

John was in full-on detective-mode, which was unusual for him. He figured that while he was no Sherlock Holmes, he was not an unintelligent man, and someone with a basic sense of how a mad, criminal genius worked could try and follow his tracks. So he took all his night shifts off and begin to do what Sherlock had always prayed that he would—he _observed_.

The trick was to notice things in plain sight. He started reading the paper cover to cover, circling anything suspicious with red pen. At first it felt a bit silly, circling ads in the back advertising huge rewards for a lost cat or pearl necklace. It very well made John want to crumple up each paper and give up.

But three weeks later, there it was in some small, two-inch article overshadowed by some story about a man lying in front of a bulldozer to stop a bypass being built through his house. A missing person—Anna Zwerling. Apparently missing without out trace of evidence as to who kidnapped her.

John smiled crookedly to himself as he circled it. _Got you_.

He placed a call to Lestrade, who was back in business. They were investigating it.

Exactly a week later, Finnegan O'Moore was missing, too, without a trace. John started to pin things to the wall above the couch which he could stare at while drinking a cuppa and sitting in his armchair.

Names were added to the list more quickly: Ronald Burrs, Howard Ashford, Ariel Squires, Jennifer Conrad, Missy Harris, Eddie Grass. John got all their pictures, where they lived, where they worked, and when they were last seen.

And eventually the Yard called him in, one late afternoon, to help with their investigation.

"Look, it's the thief of Bank of England," Donovan joked when John came in with all of his homework. "How was the big house?"

John only rolled his eyes. "Didn't we already establish there was no possible way that I stole all that money? Besides, I was only in there for one night. It wasn't all that bad for one night—I'd spent less comfortable nights."

"Enough teasing, Donovan, or I'll send you out. All right, Watson," Lestrade said, "it's safe to assume these are Sherlock's doing?"

"It's not safe to assume anything yet," he replied. "Disappearances are sometimes unrelated."

"Not right now, they aren't," Donovan smirked. "Come on, this is round three. And we can expect it's going to be big. Eight kidnappings without a smidge of evidence. No forced entry into their homes, no witnesses."

"Any similarities between the victims?"

"That's what we called you in for. I'm assuming you already did your research on the victims?"

"Any more would be helpful," John said. He laid his papers out on the table in the room and stared hard at them. "They live in all different parts of town, they were last seen at different locales, and they don't work in the same place."

"They all seem to have disappeared between the hours of 7 and 10," Lestrade offered. "Sometime in the morning. And all accounts of the mornings of their kidnapping say that there was no struggle to indicate that someone was being taken."

"So is it like the bloke with the pills, then? They went with Sherlock and Moriarty willingly? Maybe they had dirt on their victims," Donovan suggested.

John shook his head. "It's been done. Sherlock would never follow the framework of one of his previous cases. It's too simple." He bent his head over the pictures and newspaper articles, willing his brain to fire faster. "All captured some time in the morning?"

"Never punched in at work."

"So they were all kidnapped some time on their way to work," John said. He grumbled and rubbed his forehead. "No sign of struggle, but probably not coerced. Sherlock wouldn't use dirt on them and he wouldn't point a gun to them—he thinks he's above it. Probably something chemical of Sherlock's own making, like a drug or some sort of anesthetic. Very clean, no messes."

"If he drugged anyone, he would have had to carry them somewhere. What did he do with them?" Lestrade asked.

"Hmm…" John kept looking at the table of evidence. "They don't work in the same building. Where do they all work? Do you have a list?"

Lestrade flipped through his stack of papers. "All right—Missy Harris, barista at Caffe Nero; Ronald Burrs, security guard at Portcullis House; Eddie Grass, clerk at Tesco—"

"Wait," John said, holding up a finger. "Wait. Portcullis House?"

"The office building for Parliament, yeah."

"We had a case there about two months ago, I remember," John said. "Sherlock was being a sod and I remember leaving the building and getting some air. I went to a café…"

"I thought you said Sherlock wouldn't repeat anything he'd seen in a previous case," Lestrade pointed out.

"I don't think he is. I think that's not important, where they work—I think—" John snapped his fingers when the idea hit him. "I need a map of the area near Portcullis House."

Donovan pulled up a map on her computer and turned it to face John.

"There, see? Caffe Nero, a little shop right by Portcullis House. And you said one of the victims was a Tesco worker?" He pointed to the screen. "Next to Caffe Nero."

"They all work in the same area," Lestrade realized.

"Who else? Where do they all work?"

"Er—Howard Ashford is a car insurance broker—oh, _look_, there's an office across the street from the café—and Jennifer Conrad worked at WHSmith."

Donovan marked all the places on the map as Lestrade said them, and the greater picture started to dawn on them. Of the eight kidnapped victims, five of them worked near Portcullis House.

"So Sherlock captured them all from the same area. He's getting lazy," Lestrade said. "He could have picked them all up off the Tube."

"Sherlock's anything but lazy. If he didn't care where he got his victims, that shows that who his victims are isn't important. But the location might be," John said. "What do we know?"

"We don't _know _anything!" Donovan cried. "This is all guesswork!"

"Sherlock would _never _say that. He'd say that we had all the answers in front of us and we weren't observing what was in plain sight." John shut out Donovan's whiny grimace and Lestrade's nervous shuffling, all the clutter of the office as night began to descend on the Yard. He shut it all out and thought only of him.

Not the new Sherlock, full of secrets, who John wanted to trust but found himself doubting at times.

Not Moriarty's Sherlock—John didn't even want to think about him.

Just his best friend, the man who had taught him so much.

"Get out."

"What?"

"You heard me," John said. "I need to think."

"You're beginning to sound like Sher—"

"Well, maybe I need to check my _bloody mind palace_, all right?" John said. "Just do it, will you? Ten minutes, that's all I'm asking. I need quiet."

Lestrade raised an eyebrow at him before ushering Donovan out of the office, and the door shut resoundingly behind him. John sat in Donovan's chair, looking at the computer, the evidence, the papers, and pressed his hands together under his chin. "All right, Sherlock," he said to himself, "if you were here, with me…what would you do? What would you _see_?"

He felt stupid at first, but he was alone and no one could judge him consulting memories. John imagined Sherlock lying languidly on their couch, two nicotine patches on his arm, looking at him condescendingly.

_John, it's so maddeningly simple. Can't you see?_

"No, I can't. I can't, not like you."

_Don't be stupid. You've always been a catalyst for clarity, at least for me. Be one for yourself._

He squinted at the map. "Five of the eight kidnap victims work near Portcullis House. You probably took them on the way to work."

_Good. How do you know?_

"They were taken between 7 and 10 in the morning. On their way to work, like I said. There's a Tube station nearby."

_Good. What of the other three?_

"They could be going to meetings, they could have the day off, they could be visiting someone. I thought who the victims were didn't matter."

_You decided that. If it's unimportant, then move on. How did I take the victims without struggle?_

"If you didn't just grab them off the Tube, then you either pointed a gun to their head and threatened them, used information against them to force them to go with you, or drugged them and dragged them off."

_And your hypothesis is…_

"Drugs. More your style. A gun is tedious and would draw attention. Deducing information from them—affairs, crimes, the like—is small potatoes compared to the chemical fun you could have." John smiled. "You could have administered them in a thousand ways, and when they were stumbling around, drugged, you could have pretended to be their friend trying to get them home after a night of drinking."

_Quite possible. More important than how I took them is where I took them. That's what you're trying to find out._

"Where you took them… Sherlock, you haven't left me any clues!"

_I've left you everything you need. Am I a strong man?_

"Not really, mate."

_Is it conceivable that I carried them a long distance?_

John giggled to himself. It was almost too bizarre, speaking to himself on Sherlock's behalf. But he'd come this far. "Probably not. Maybe you had a van."

_Absurd. Of course I didn't._

"No? How do I know?"

_How DO you know?_

John grimaced, at a standstill. "If you'd had a van, you really take people anywhere. But…if you had a van, you wouldn't have needed to concentrate your kidnapping to one area."

The Sherlock of his mind sniffed. _And vans are obvious_.

John grinned. Vans _were _obvious. "Cabs, then?"

_John, we've already ruled out transportation with wheels. Think._

"I'm thinking, I'm thinking!" John tapped his chin. "Why can't you just explain it to me?"

_I'm a construct of your own imagination. I'm only repeating back the facts you know in a voice you find comforting._

He groaned out loud and rested his forehead on the desk. "I don't know. I don't know. I just…fuck. Fuck, fuck, bugger it all. I'm not you."

_If you were, I wouldn't find you half as entertaining._

"You captured everyone from the same area for a reason. You didn't plan on taking them far. You picked that Tube station for a reason."

_Good. Why?_

"Because…I don't _know!_" he said. "You're playing a game with me, and this is the third part."

_Yes. What else?_

"You told me what was coming next would make me hate you. You haven't killed anyone, have you?"

_I don't know. You'll find out, I suppose._

"You wouldn't kill them. I don't believe you would."

_Blind faith is not evidence, John._

"All right—if you killed them, there'd be nothing to play for. I'm meant to find you."

_Look for patterns. What were my last targets?_

"The Yard. Bank of England. And the location is important…" He furrowed his brow. "Portcullis House? Is that your next target? You took your victims there, where all the members of Parliament work?"

_Possibly._

"No—_no, _I'm wrong! I said it before—you wouldn't repeat anything you'd already done. You've already solved something there. You won't go back. And this is the third game, this is bigger, this is scarier…this is targeting England."

John pulled up the map and zoomed out a bit. "You picked the place you took them from. You couldn't take your victims far. You're trying to up the stakes and show England that it's not safe."

_You sound like you're about to make a conclusion._

"I already have. I know exactly where you took them. It's a bit obvious, but I'm guessing Moriarty picked the location because it's flashy and it'll make headlines." John frowned. "But the three who didn't work nearby. Were they random people or did you pick them on purpose?"

But he'd lost his perfect picture of Sherlock and couldn't figure it out on his own. "Lestrade!" he shouted. "Lestrade, I know where he took them! We need to move, now!"


	9. Chapter 9

What the tourists didn't understand and so often got wrong was that Big Ben wasn't the name of the clock tower at all. Big Ben was the bell that tolled out the hours behind the enormous clock face. It hardly mattered in the scheme of things, though—if you were referring to Big Ben, Londoner or not, you didn't just mean the bell.

Who would only refer to the bell? Such idiots.

"Please, sir…_please_…"

People were such idiots.

"Please…_please, _sir. I have a _family_, I have a _child_… Please, let us go…"

So boring.

"We've done _nothing_…"

Jim hadn't noticed the quiet moaning, the scratchy whispers next to his chair. He'd made Seb get him a nice chair, something ornate by the looks of it, with plush red velvet and lion's claw for feet, but it wasn't very comfortable. That annoyed him.

"Sir, I'm begging you…I'm begging you, _please_ let us go…"

He rolled his eyes. "Seb. Some quiet."

He didn't bother looking, only listening to the loud thumps of Sebastian's leather boots and the bone-shattering crack of his hand against someone's head. And then the whimpering stopped.

Cracking his neck, Jim glanced over to the line of people. Sherlock had done a very efficient job of binding them together with something as rudimentary as rope. The eight sullen, sunken captives were tied wrist to wrist behind their back, curled up close and silent, for the most part. Occasionally they were prone to weeping, but at least they'd given up screaming for help. Sebastian had taken care of that.

Jim sniffed at the stink of it all. The captives had been here for days, some even weeks. Sherlock had insisted that they be fed and given breaks to piss, which he was responsible for taking care of.

He hadn't liked that. Sherlock wanting to take care of them. But Sherlock reasoned it was better than letting them wallow in their own filth. Still, they hadn't bathed in so long that the entire clock smelled of rot.

Well, it wasn't exactly the _clock_. It was behind the clock. Honestly, people wondered how geniuses did it—it was blindingly simple. All he'd had to do was forge a few simple repair documents and put a 'DO NOT ENTER' sign and chains over the stairs to the clock face. According to the official documents, the clock was due for repairs.

Really, it had been Jim's personal playground. His own waiting lair. And he'd been waiting, ever since they'd set up for the game. Sherlock had taken care of the kidnapping, since Jim didn't want to get his hands dirty. Besides, Sherly had liked that—trying his hand at actual crime. Facilitating the capture.

Jim had watched Sherlock in the preceding weeks, bent over computers and maps and beakers with a manic gleam in his eye. Sherlock had felt it—the rush of something so well-planned, so vicious and masterful.

The sex after had been glorious. He was fortunate that Sherlock hadn't been caught off guard by the games Jim liked to play in bed, too.

"Sherly," Jim drawled from his chair. "Why hasn't your little rat figured it out yet? I'm bored."

Sherlock, who had been standing in the shadows, paused before he responded. "Watson isn't you, Jim."

"He isn't." Jim mused on that and looked around. The room was on the left side of the north-facing clock, full of the gears that grinded loudly to move the hands of time. Their captives were lined against the back wall, pinned behind a huge gear that clicked maddeningly every second of every day. The kidnapped victims hadn't been able to shut it out of their heads. It made for some delicious insanity.

Jim was still bored. He flicked some lint off the shoulder of his Westwood and eyed Seb across the crowded little room. He was sharpening one of his many knives on a metal stick, and the sick sound of metal on metal made scrumptious shivers ripple down Jim's spine.

Playfully he bounced off his chair, around the machinery, and over to Sherlock, nudging him on the shoulder. "Sherly."

"…Yes?"

"You did well this time. I'm really impressed at how manly you must have seemed, draaaagging all these people in here all by yourself."

"It was a simple, general anesthetic that simply dulled the senses. I didn't drag anyone, I pushed them up the stairs," Sherlock said.

"You're not taking the compliment," he whined. "I said I thought you were _manly_."

Sherlock sighed and turned to face the shorter man, then leaned forward and kissed him, almost as a custom. He pulled away looking uninterested. "You're a horny bastard when you're bored."

Jim grimaced. "You're no fun at all. And you're only horny when you're angry."

Sherlock smirked. "So get me angry or get back to waiting, if you can stand it. We reserve sex for victories exclusively."

"Since when did you become kinky Pavlov?" Jim pouted. "Sherlock, if he doesn't get here in the next hour, I'm going to be even more bored. I'll start cutting off fingers."

"You'll just get Moran to do it," Sherlock said. "He'll be here. He maybe be thick but he's not half as dull as the apes they having working at the Yard. John will be here."

"He hasn't really been any fun so far," Jim complained. He fingered the lapels of Sherlock's suit—a Westwood, all black, which he'd picked—and ran a nail along the top button. "Why are you holding him at arm's length, hmm?"

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "You're beginning to sound like him. He doesn't believe I'm on your side, not for a moment—and for some reason, neither do you."

Jim pecked him on the cheek. "Can I help it that we have trust issues?"

He grinned in spite of himself, grabbed Jim by the front of his suit, and pulled him up for a more passionate kiss. "It's _you_, Jim," he grinned into the kiss, biting down hard on Jim's lip.

Jim laughed softly. "Don't wrinkle this shirt, dear."

"It's what you've shown me, _that's _what I want. That's what I've been craving all my life. And I hate repetition, so don't make me repeat this." Sherlock nipped the edge of Jim's jaw, purring the words, and then shoved him away.

Jim only chuckled. "To be continued."

And then they heard the faint sound of sirens outside, which wasn't unusual for the busy place they were situated in, but then the sirens became more insistent and the wail didn't soften, and they smiled.

"I hope you're ready, kids," Jim said to the cowering captives, whose heads had peeked out hopefully at the sound of possible hope. "You're about to have some fun. Or at least, I am." He eyed Sherlock. "You're to handle them until I'm done dealing with John."

"And I get to finish?"

"If you're good."


	10. Chapter 10

**Hi, everyone. Be warned-this chapter, while not super graphic, may have some sort of triggers for some people.**

**And y'all are probably going to hate me for this chapter. I am so sorry-so very sorry for any excess of feels, anger, or fear. I am not a mean person. I do not like pain or hurting people. If you guys feel like you need some proof of this, please feel free to check out my entire catalogue of fluff and romance. I have a Reichenbach reunion fic and a Parent!lock that isn't terribly sad and is mostly just cute. Consider this evidence that I am not a sadistic fanfiction author.**

**Please, dear people, stick with me, and this story, if you can. If you can't, I understand. Everyone has their limits when it comes to the characters they love. Have faith if you can. Bless, my dears.**

* * *

"Where the _hell_ in the building are they _hiding_ everyone?" Lestrade griped as he threw his cruiser into park. He technically was not cleared to drive, but since he _was _the police, everyone chose to overlook it.

John shook his head, looking tensely ahead through the windshield as rain began to pound on it. He hadn't noticed when it started raining. "Send people everywhere. Scale the tower if you have to, but I promise you, they're here—somewhere. Somewhere dramatic, somewhere hidden."

"Somewhere that could fit at least eight people," Donovan added, jumping out of the car and shielding her face from the rain with her upturned collar. "All right, everyone," she announced to the gathering officers who were parking and loading out, "we're looking for eight captives somewhere in the clock tower. We don't know if they're alive or dead, all together or not, but you've all been briefed and given photographs, so you know who to look for."

Groups nodded and began to enter the tower while others put up crime scene tape around the perimeter. No one bothered John—at this point, he'd achieved a sort of special status that only Sherlock had received before. They let him work.

He stared up through the rain at the clock tower, glowing brightly in the night sky like some laughing face. Sherlock was up there, _his _Sherlock. The one he'd imagined and done everything for so far. Sherlock had led him here, and John was tired of the games and the confusion.

He was tired of doubt. He was going to bring Sherlock home tonight or he might as well die, because he couldn't keep up with the dark. It was too clever, too quick, and too painful.

John realized there was a curious honesty in darkness. Some quality of shadow, the quality that made it so easy for people to succumb to passion and stupidity, made brazen the basic human desire that was always shrouded in light. Sherlock's desire had been darkness because it wouldn't lie to him and he didn't have to lie to it.

Maybe the solution to all of this would be to stop trying to convince Sherlock that he was lying to one person or another. Maybe the solution was to understand that Sherlock was telling the truth when he said he was tired.

"Where do you figure into this, mate?" Lestrade asked after directing some junior investigators. "Where are you going?"

The key was to show Sherlock he was wrong about what everyone thought of the nature of good and evil. He was wrong because John would accept both, the good in Sherlock and the cruelty, because there was good and cruelty in himself. "I'm going to Sherlock. I'm ending this, if I can."

Lestrade nodded. "Need back-up?"

"You have victims to find and teams to lead. Don't worry about me, mate. We'll get a pint after all this, all right? You, me, and Sherlock. I promise." He trudged, determined, through the quickly accumulating puddles and ducked into the building.

The police were doing a thorough sweep throughout the entire building, and John slipped as best he could past them to the stairs to make his way up to the clock before he heard shouts.

"He's here! They're all here!"

"You're under arrest in the name of—"

"You don't have to say anything, but it may harm your defense if—bloody hell, we need back-up!"

John picked up his pace and took the stairs two at a time as the voices grew panicked.

"Fuck, he's pointing a gun at the captives—lower your weapons!"

"Moriarty," John whispered to himself, bounding up the stairs and pushing through the police. He nearly tripped over himself, jaw flying open, when he saw what was in front of them all.

The hostages, all tied together, were cowering behind the massive ticking machinery in the mechanism room—filthy, with matted hair and ratty clothes and red wrists from the ropes binding them. One woman, quivering and silent, stared up the barrel of a Browning L9A1, held firmly in the hand of Sherlock Holmes.

"Sherlock, _no_," John breathed.

Sherlock pretended not to hear. Looking as perfectly calm as always, and frankly, rather on the devilish side in a tailored, black Westwood, Sherlock eyed the superior officer without a word.

"Right, then," a voice said from the shadows, "this is a bit tense, isn't it?"

Jim Moriary emerged from the darkness with his hands in his pockets, look every bit as boyish and demonic as when John first met him. His fists curled.

Jim whistled. "Lots of big, noisy guns in the room. While you gents have every power in the world to shoot me, that power presents some problems. One, I am much cleverer than any of you put together. Two, I have a very clever friend with a nice gun that he borrowed from a friend—an army doctor—and another friend, not as clever but more of a brute, with a gun behind all this machinery. His gun's quite a bit bigger, and if you do choose to shoot at me, Sherlock here will pump your little hostages full of bullets faster than you can say 'casualty.' And Moran in the back will use his big gun to get all of you, and he has quite the superior position back there. So let's all just calm down a bit." He rolled his eyes. "Melodramatic lot."

Sherlock smirked.

"Now, you are all going to leave the room in ten seconds or this negotiation gets nasty. That's all this is, now, a negotiation."

Lestrade burst through the door and onto the scene. "Sherlock, what the _fuck_—"

"Inspector Lestrade, I've made my lone demand," Moriarty said impatiently. "Not my fault you were late. Everyone's to leave the room…except Johnny. He'll be negotiating on your behalf."

Lestrade balked. "You're really—you're barking mad. He doesn't have any negotiating power or skill, he doesn't have any bargaining chips!"

"Tut, tut," scolded Moriarty. "He's not that worthless. He's the one who actually put the pieces together, not that it was _hard_. It's boring, really, playing to his level. But it's what we've got—maybe you should retire after that little explosion, Greg. It's made you lose your touch. Johnny could replace you."

"You bloody bastard."

"As I said. Johnny's staying. If you want any chance of taking these people home tonight in something other than a body bag, you'll let him stay and send everyone outside the building." Moriarty suddenly glared, dead eyes unrelenting. "_NOW._"

Lestrade stood his ground and spoke to John without looking at him. "I don't think this is in your power, with all due respect. These are a bunch of nutters."

"If we don't want anyone dead, we have to do as he says," John said firmly. He looked at the woman Sherlock held the Browning to—_his _Browning, how did he get _that_… She was a sallow woman with blonde hair in a ponytail. Looking from the gun to John, she gulped and closed her eyes.

Lestrade's face was red, but he nodded and led his team out of the tower. "You get ten minutes."

The police cleared out slowly, shuffling while casting looks on everyone left in the room. John held himself to his full height and felt the weight of his pistol in its holster on his waist. His eyes were fixed on the Browning.

When everyone was gone, Moriarty smiled. "Johnny. I almost didn't think you'd figure it out. I was about to start slicing off fingers."

"Don't know why—how would you climb over your web with less than ten fingers?" John attempted flatly, and Moriarty rewarded him with a chuckle. "What's all this, then? The third game."

"The usual tirade," Moriarty explained. "Terrorizing England, making little messes. You should see what we have lined up for the grand finale. Well, I don't really want you to _see_ it…_enjoy _it is a better word."

"Enjoy? Enjoy what, exactly?"

Moriarty sniffed, irritated already. "I'm going to make this easy for you to understand, John. Sherlock and I are having a grand time planning all this mayhem, but knowing that you're there with little Lestrade and Sally is sort of putting a damper on all our fun. And for some reason, Sherlock still feels attached to you, though he'd never admit it. Look at him—he didn't know I was going to say all this…"

John's eyes flickered to Sherlock, who betrayed nothing. He looked briefly over at John, who attempted not to weaken after looking back.

"In short, Johnny—we're having a party at Buckingham Palace. And you're invited."

"What?"

"You're invited. To the team. You get a free pass—not only do I promise not to kill you, Captain Watson, but I'd even extend to you the offer of partnership."

John blinked. "You want me—_me_—to join forces with you? Like Sherlock?"

"Surprising, isn't it?"

"But I'm not—I'm not anything like you."

Moriarty rolled his eyes. "I know. Don't make me change my mind. I don't like things that stand in my way, and I like things that make my life easier. You bring Sherlock clarity in a way that I…can't. Yet. And I can't wait for him to get the spark of genius all the time. You probably never got the chance to find this out, but sex does nothing good for the mind of Sherlock Holmes. But somehow you do."

John winced internally at that. Moriarty could be joking, must be joking, but still…the idea of Moriarty's snakelike arms over Sherlock's body, touching things that John had only ever thought about in fleeting, embarrassed moments and dreams…

"You want me to join you."

"I dislike repetition."

"Sorry—it's just—"

John considered his options. There was no way in hell that he'd ever willingly go to Moriarty's side, to the side that killed and hurt without mercy, but if he could pull a Sherlock Holmes and make him believe that he was on his side...

He wasn't that good of an actor. Not smart enough, nowhere near clever enough, never…

"What's this got to do with the hostages, then?" John asked, gesturing to the eight shuddering figures behind the gears. "This is a negotiation, isn't it?"

"It is—for your service, not for their lives. I didn't specify," Moriarty said with a sly grin. "You really should start paying attention."

John gulped and looked to Sherlock, studying his emotionless eyes for some sort of answer. This had to be a trap of sorts, unless it was only truth and opportunity for him to do _something_, but he could lose everything if he said yes. There was no way he _could _say yes.

"Sorry, Jim. I think I'll take my chances," he said.

Moriarty frowned. "That so?"

"Yes."

"Shame, that. That was the easy part." Moriarty coughed and then shrugged. "Right, then, Sherlock—shoot."

"What!? Wait, _no_—"

"Maybe I didn't mention—I thought this went without saying—that if you didn't join us, you'd lose out on the hostages."

"My life for theirs?" John asked desperately. "If I'd known that, I wouldn't have—"

"Oh, I know. Pity. Sherlock…"

"_WAIT!_" John screamed. "_Just—just wait, all right?_ Let me—I need to think."

"I don't feel like waiting. I've been waiting all week for you, Captain, and if you're not coming to the party, then you at least have to send us a consolation present. My present is watching you as Sherlock kills these hostages, and you get to know that they died because of your _morals_."

"Sherlock," John said, appealing directly to his best friend, "Sherlock, you can't—_Sherlock_. Listen. There's something I wanted to tell you."

"It won't do any good to declare your love for him now, Johnny," Moriarty drawled. "He's a bit attached to me."

"Sherlock, please. I'm out of options now, and there's no other time for me to say it—you already—you already _know_, everything I could say about how I feel, you've already guessed. And you've used it against me, and you're right, because I do have these feelings, feelings for you that I don't quite understand."

"Oh, this is gorgeous," Moriarty laughed. "Seb, get out your phone—I want this recorded."

"Sherlock," John continued, "I'm not here to tell you how I feel about you. I don't think it would change anything, if I did. I only mean to say…you were right, back at the pool. In the file room. You were right, and I'm sorry."

Sherlock said nothing, didn't move at all—but John looked desperately, pleadingly into the maelstrom of his eyes. They were a color he'd never categorized before and they kept him grounded now.

"I'm so sorry," he choked. "You _were _right, and it's not just about you. It's about all of us. We all are evil, we're all wrong—to the point where there's, there's no _definition_ of wrong anymore and only what people _say _is wrong. And the parts we don't like, we box up. I boxed you up—I wanted you to change into something you weren't meant to be." He slipped his own gun out of its holster and placed in on the floor in an admittedly stupid gesture of peace. "You're not meant to be polite all the time or kind all the time or anything, because no one is. Especially you. You're so different, and I didn't realize. I just wanted you to be more like me, like what I thought I was supposed to be.

"But don't you see, Sherlock?" he continued, stepping forward. "I understand that, I can change it. You and me, we've made an arse-load of mistakes, but I'm going to try and stop, and I'm accepting it. You. Now."

"John…" Sherlock began, but he thought the better of it.

"I accept _you_, Sherlock Holmes, the parts of you that—that want to hurt and see pain. Because that's human, sometimes, and I'm not immune to it. I've had enemies, and I've wanted to see them hurt. I accept the parts of you that want to break boundaries and be alone, and I accept the same parts that love Mrs. Hudson and want to keep her safe, so safe that when you broke into 221B you left her completely safe, the parts that love Lestrade so you let him escape with the bomb, the parts that love me so you can't hurt me. I accept all that—_all that_, Sherlock—and I will accept it forever if you can take it from me, too." He licked his lips, feeling the air thicken with tension. Moriarty was glaring at him. "You and me, we can end this now. You can do whatever you want, and I'll be with you, no matter what. That's what I'm in for. If you go down, I'll go down, too—just stop. Just—just, look at me, and know that I'm serious. You _know_ me. I can't lie worth a damn, and I wouldn't make up these feelings for a bloke unless they meant something to me."

"Sherlock," Moriarty warned.

Sherlock glanced over at Moriarty, then at John, and blinked once. Twice. "I was right."

"Yes, you were. No more boxes."

"No. Your faith. It dies tonight, like I predicted." And without another word, he swiveled on the spot and shot the blond woman neatly in the head.

The other seven captives screamed and pulled away, but the bullet made its way neatly through the woman's forehead and out, sending blood down her face in a small, almost-black trickle.

Moriarty laughed while John fell to his knees in utter shock. His medical training kicked in, wanting to move toward the woman and help her, but her eyes were vacant and blood gushed from the back of her head.

_Bullet wounds to the head from a high-caliber pistol will make a smaller entry wound than the exit wound—the exit would is usually bigger, there's more blood—oh, fuck, FUCK, Sherlock—Sherlock—_

"No," he moaned. "_No, you can't do this_."

"My turn, now, I think? Jim?"

"It's your turn, all right. You've earned it."

"Right, then. It's done, John. The game, it's over. Your ridiculous and ill-deserved belief in me has run its course. And hopefully any _love _you had for me is gone, because I certainly don't want or need it. I am not _good_. I am not _YOURS_. I am Sherlock Holmes, and I don't need you. I never have."

"…_Stop_…" John begged. "Just _stop_—I didn't say I'd stopped believing, I said—I said I'd _accept_—fuck—"

"You can't accept this. This isn't who you are. And sentiment is a chemical defect found in the losing side," Sherlock said. "There is no way in hell I'm going to let you beat me."

"You can _stop_…Mycroft will help us, just—don't go down this road, don't make me _lose you_… Sherlock, you killed her, you're not a killer, you're _not_."

"We both are, now, Captain. If you can endure that."

"That's different—that's duty."

"So is this." Sherlock dropped the gun and knelt down to move toward John, who recoiled away with a hiss. "I told you not to make me a hero." He smiled wickedly. "Death, though…it's a bit obvious, isn't it?"

"Don't go soft now, Sherly," Moriarty said. "You've come too far tonight."

"I won't disappoint you, Jim. I'm finishing this." He raked his eyes up and down John's body once. "Every soldier needs a scar from the battlefield."

What happened next occurred too fast for John to really comprehend. Suddenly, Sherlock's arms were flying and his elbows landed hard in the middle of his gut, pushing John to the ground.

A sick crunch echoed across the small room, nearly drowned out by the clicks of the clock gears, but then John's screams filled the volume of the room and settled into every crevice, for Sherlock had slammed his foot into John's knee and stomped on it again for good measure, sending bones cracking in all different pieces and directions.

John moaned in pain, clutching at his shattered knee, and gasped as his vision disappeared from him. He tried grasping at it to keep the room in his sight, trying to form words, images, sounds other than whimpers…

Sherlock removed his foot. "That's the bum leg from the war, too. Pity. At least the damage used to be all in his head."

"BASTARD!" John roared, curling to his side to hold in the white hot pain coiling in his body.

Moriarty chuckled. "That might be the most gorgeous thing I've seen in my life. I've been outdone. I need to get a pet I can break, too. I'm jealous."

"Let's get out of here. I want sex," Sherlock said plainly, beckoning to Moran to move. "They can take care of the body and the rest." He stepped over John and made toward the door.

"Liar!" John choked out as he left, and Sherlock paused.

"Liar?"

"You're not…this is _too _far…too far for anyone—but I don't _believe you_." Through the torment that burned his leg, he looked up at Sherlock with the smallest, barest smile. "You're…lying to him. He'll see…that soon… _You're. Not. Evil_."

Sherlock looked genuinely hurt. "No? Perhaps I haven't done a good job of it. Well, Johnny, let's say you're right. Let's say I joined Jim to take him down and everything I've done, from injuring Lestrade to framing you for robbery to murder, was all an elaborate scheme to keep you safe, because I'm in love with you."

"Sounds…like…you…"

"A bloody valentine. Quaint. Well, John, if all that were true," he whispered lovingly, adoringly, as he bent over to speak directly to the writhing soldier, "then why would I do this?'

He slammed his foot once more onto John's leg, and John had twenty seconds of blinding agony before he slipped into blackness.


	11. Chapter 11

Voices swam in and out of John's head, shredded by ribbons of pain.

He'd experienced pain before. He'd been shot on the plains of Afghanistan. He'd stared at death in the face and he knew he wasn't terribly injured now. He'd live to see another day.

So why did it feel like he was dying?

"Get to work on those ropes—be _careful_ of the body, I'll call Molly for that—_bloody hell, John!_"

_It's done, John. The game, it's over._

"Fuck…_fuck_, he's bleeding, his leg is broken—he's unconscious—DONOVAN, WE NEED A STRETCHER!"

"Is that—John! What _happened_ to him!?"

"John, can you hear me? It's going to be all right, we're taking you to St. Bart's. John?"

_I am not good. I am not YOURS._

"Bloody freak must've broken it—Lestrade, that's the leg he used to limp on, will it be okay? Fuck, this is _unbelievable_!"

"I need a stretcher over here, and we need more ambulances! Shock blankets, a body bag—and start clearing the area! Keep the paparazzi out, do you hear?"

"John—John, we're getting help, all right? The victims are fine, they're safe, you saved them."

Cool fingers feathered his hairline; he could feel them. Donovan's, probably. Lestrade was ripping something—he could hear that—and suddenly there was pressure on his leg. John convulsed.

"Lestrade, _stop_, you're hurting him!"

"He has an open fracture, Sally—do you not _see _the blood? If he loses too much, we'll never get him back!"

Open fracture. That meant that bone had broken through skin. John knew that.

_I don't need you. I never have._

Strong hands pulled something above his knee, tying tightly. John screamed.

"They're bringing a stretcher up now, Lestrade—"

"Anderson, have someone take care of the body. Is there anyone on Sherlock and Moriarty's trail?"

"We sent three cars after them."

"Right. Okay, John, I'm sorry, but we've gotta move you out, mate."

John didn't respond, couldn't respond. Nothing worked but his ears, which heard snippets of everything that went around him—the wails of the sirens, the mutterings of police, the thick drip of his blood on the floor.

His blood, on the floor. Sherlock's fault.

_I told you not to make me a hero._

"All right, mind his leg—lift him up, let's get him out of here."

Suddenly his nerves worked just as well, and his leg was on fire. The sting of blood and bone paralyzed him as they lifted him onto a stretcher, and robbed of sight and movement, he only howled and tried to thrash.

"John, we have to—"

"Watson—"

"Hell, this whole thing is a bloody mess."

John moaned as they jostled him down the steps. Having dealt with pain in the past didn't make it easier now. He could hear the crunch of shattered bone inside his knee, feel the break of skin where bone split through.

When he was shot, his fear of dying had overcome the pain that sliced through his torso. He'd focused on prayer, on survival, rather than the initial impact of the bullet through his chest.

John wasn't dying now. John had nothing else to focus on but the pain.

_Death, though…it's a bit obvious, isn't it?_

Sirens pierced his ears as they left the tower, shouting and loading him into the back of an ambulance. Red and blue lights floated over his eyelids as EMTs got to work tearing fabric from the matted blood on his leg and stabilizing him. Shock blankets, IV fluids, calling St. Bart's to prep for surgery.

"Open fracture—"

"—A&E, or surgery—"

"—losing a lot of blood, but he should—"

"—good physical condition, he'll be—"

"—army doctor, the guy said, so you should call—"

"—does he have any history of—"

John tried his best to listen to all of it rather than tune it out and feel nothing but his broken leg, but someone mercifully slipped a needle into his arm and within second, clouds started blossoming inside his body, overtaking the slicing ribbons of pain and dulling everything.

The voices weren't so sharp anymore. Nothing was.

Everything slowed to a purple darkness, waves that John struggled to float in. There was a different kind of pain if he succumbed to it, the pain of the truth. He swam above it until his mind gave out and he sank into the silence where only Sherlock's voice echoed.

_Well, John, if all that were true…then why would I do this?_

Why was right.

Why?

There was more noise, and jostling, and John was slightly aware that he was being moved. There were beeps and shouts and sharp turns, and more beeps, and words…

"—broken—"

"—fractured his—"

"—PTSD-induced limp—"

"—file says—"

"—won't heal right—"

"—he'll need a cane—"

"—permanent damage, at his age—"

"—the rest of his life."

_Every soldier needs a scar from the battlefield._

"Sherlock..." he whispered, his throat dry and thick, "what…have you done to me?"

"Surgery, right away—corridor three, now."


	12. Chapter 12

Molly Hooper read somewhere that peonies symbolized good health, so on her lunch break, she left St. Bart's to get some. She always thought the hospital flowers were a bit lacking, anyway.

Carmichael's corner store on the next block sold flowers out front and a few creature comforts inside. She was going to buy a big bouquet, but she saw John's favorite jam in the window next to the breads of the day and decided to forgo the large bouquet for a smaller one and the can of jam. She picked up some biscuits to go with it and made her way back to John's room.

She picked up the reports from the woman who'd died that night. Anna Zwerling, aged 42, died of a gunshot wound to the head. From Sherlock's gun. Molly shivered and hid the papers in her bag, where John couldn't see them.

She knocked three times on the door and didn't wait for an answer, instead plastering a huge smile on her face. "Hi, John! It's me, Molly—are you awake, then?"

He was clearly awake—she could see him staring at the ceiling—but he didn't respond right away. Finally: "Hi, Molly."

"How're you feeling? It's been, what, two days since the surgery? I hear Dr. Baldwin did a great job with the—the bone thing."

John looked morosely down at the huge bulge of his plastered leg under the scratchy hospital blanket. "So I hear."

"Right." Molly clutched her bag awkwardly before shaking her head and pulling up a chair. "I brought these for you," she said, putting the peonies by his bedside. "They're supposed to represent good health. I read that in a book somewhere. And I brought your favorite jam, and biscuits, since I know hospital food is just awful."

That got a small smile out of him. "Ta, Molly."

She got to work preparing biscuits for them while she talked. "You look really awful, John. How've they been treating you?"

"The doctors? They've been fine," John said, looking down at himself. The loss of blood and subsequent blood transfusions had made his skin a sallow yellow, and he knew his hair was a mess and his eyes had dark circles under them. They could only get him to sleep when they drugged him.

"I mean…the people who've been in to see you. I imagine it's been a nasty parade, having to put on a show for everyone."

John frowned. "What do you mean?"

"You know, telling them you feel fine, listening to them tell you what a strong patient you are…it's annoying sometimes. I can tell," she replied. "Biscuit?"

He took it gratefully. "Thanks. Well, it's not too bad. Mrs. Hudson just cries, Harry just cries…she thinks if she'd been a better sister, I wouldn't have gotten involved with Sherlock at all, and now she's swearing off drinking, at least for now. Lestrade's been round, even Mycroft. But I can't bloody stand either of them."

Molly nodded. "I'm sure they only talk about things you don't want to."

"Pretty much." He sighed. "Not that I don't think about those things when they leave, though."

"We don't have to talk about it…"

"No. I suppose we don't."

They were silent for a while, until Molly inevitably broke. "I'm so—so sorry, John. It must be so hard, right now—"

"Yeah, we've established that."

"Not the leg. Who did it." She grimaced. "I can't imagine—well, I did the autopsy on Anna Zwerling, the woman who died that night? I just couldn't believe…"

"Yeah, well…I couldn't either." John stared down at his leg. "I was there, Molly. I saw what he did."

Molly bit her lip. "John, I was hoping…well, I know it's not exactly the best time, but when Greg was here, you were sure that Sherlock—"

"_Don't_—" John growled, making Molly drop her biscuit. "Don't say his name. I don't want—I don't want to hear it."

"I'm sorry—"

"It's fine." He paused. "I did believe it."

"Is there any chance it might still be true? Did Sher—_could he _really kill someone? Could he torture you like this?"

"Well, it wasn't the bloody Queen. Molly, I saw him do it all. There's—" He sighed, swallowed hard. "There's no chance… There's nothing left of him. Of the man we knew. He's gone, Molly."

"Oh." She shifted in her seat. "Then I'm sorry. He was a complete and utter—_twat_ to you."

John eyed her as she blushed. Apparently she'd never used that word, especially about Sherlock, before. "We're all sorry."

"But what happens now?" she asked. "Are you going to help Greg?"

"Well, they say I'll be in a cast for eight weeks, at least, and then…" John chuckled. "Fucking _hell_. Do you want to know the funniest thing, Molly?"

"S-sure."

"He broke the PTSD leg, the one that stopped limping when I met him. The first time we met, I didn't need a cane anymore. The last time…well, the injury's real now. I'll be needing that cane back, for the rest of my life. Won't be able to walk without it." He chuckled darkly for longer than Molly liked. "Isn't that just fucking peaches?"

"I'm sorry."

"I know. It's not your fault, I'm…Molly, I'm not in the best place right now. But I really appreciate the jam, and the flowers."

Molly nodded, taking her cue to leave. "It was no trouble. I'm always here if you need me. I mean, literally, I'm in the basement, so…"

"I know. Thanks, Moll."

"Oh, and John?" she asked. "What—what _are _you going to do? After you're out and about, I mean?"

John mused on that. "I suppose I'll go back to helping Lestrade. Finding Sher—finding him."

Molly wrinkled her nose and replied, "Sorry, but—after all he's done, you still want to go looking for him? Try and bring him back?"

"Bring him back?" John smiled. "Bring him _back_? No, Molly, I'm not going to bring him back. I'm going to find him and I'm going to kill him."


	13. Chapter 13

He'd been taught in sessions of useless therapy, before any of this happened, that humans went through five stages of grief when dealing with loss. His idiotic therapists were sure that part of his problem was the battlefield deaths he'd seen, but Mycroft had been right—John Watson had missed the battlefield. He hadn't been grieving anyone's death but his own uselessness.

Now he was grieving Sherlock in a very textbook way.

Step 1 was denial. As soon as he'd woken up from surgery, bleary-eyed and surrounding by loud family and friends who cried over his broken body, he'd tried to make sense of the patterns on the ceiling and the events of the night before. Events that didn't make sense, _couldn't_ make sense, because they involved Sherlock killing an innocent woman and then breaking his leg, stomping on it repeatedly until not a bone was left to salvage and a steel pipe had to be inserted to make something out of his maimed leg.

Sherlock didn't do that. Anesthesia and shock colored in his memories, the truth of the night, and_made it seem _like Sherlock was behind it all. Moriarty must have gotten Moran to do it. In a few days, the memory would return.

Step 2 was anger, which set in his first night at the hospital. John hadn't been able to sleep at all. It wasn't that he was afraid of nightmares; he wasn't in the least. He had his own way to cope with them.

In fact, sleep would have been a relief. It would have calmed him from the roiling storm in his brain when it began to dawn on him that he hadn't fabricated a painful second of that night at the tower, and Sherlock had really done it all.

He'd stared into a woman's eyes and shot her in the forehead. Remorseless.

He'd shoved John down, slammed his knee repeatedly until the damage was irreparable and John was writhing on the floor, and white bone protruded from his trouser leg. John's blood had leaked on the floor, sticky and hot, and he'd left him there.

Sherlock had left him broken for real this time. That was when John realized that everything had changed.

Which meant that he'd been wrong. This entire time, John had persisted so blindly, like a fool, in the belief that Sherlock had learned something from him and decided to become a protector. He'd tried to help Sherlock on the other side as he delved deeper into the darkness, entrenching himself in Moriarty's inner circle to take him down once and for all.

What a poor sod he was. What an utterly pitiful excuse for a soldier.

Step 3 was bargaining, but not in the traditional sense. He bargained more with himself, justifying everything he'd done. Sherlock had shown romantic interest in John before. He'd shown some sort of hope, some kind of promise. John felt it, he _knew _it, so he wasn't so very unjustified in thinking that those feelings motivated him to fight Moriarty.

He hadn't made it all up, had he?

It's not like it was _easy_, defending Sherlock to a world that hated him. It's not like it was _simple_, trying to prove himself right.

Step 4 came when the doctor told him that while the leg would heal, he would require a cane or crutch to walk for the rest of his life. Step 4 was depression, and that lasted the longest because it was so familiar to him. The feeling of being useless in his own body, stiff and broken on one side. Knowing that he could never again run—though that didn't matter much. The only man he'd ever _run_with was responsible for this. Who was left to follow?

It occurred to him, sometime on the second night, that it would be much harder to run after Sherlock when they met again.

The final step was acceptance. And on that second night, around 3 am, John calmly accepted that the one thing left to do was kill Sherlock Holmes.

It wouldn't be the first time Sherlock forced his hand to murder. But Sherlock wasn't a very nice man, not anymore. That's what made acceptance so easy.

John stayed in the hospital for another week, under observation. Surprisingly, he'd passed all of his mental health checks, but John knew he wasn't mad. He was focused. He had a goal.

When he happened to turn on the news, unfamiliar reporters told of a crime spree all over England. He saw it in the papers, too, but he didn't need any further confirmation of Sherlock's cruelty. He had the evidence in front of him—he'd have it for the rest of his life.

* * *

"Hi, you tosser," Harry said weakly when she opened the door to 221B. "Maybe you should think about selling this place. Or getting another flatmate."

"I'm not in the right mental place for real estate, Harry," John said from his chair, gesturing to his leg. He'd been back at home for a month, adjusting to the enormous cast and crutches and hating every minute of it. "Tea?"

"I'll make it. Don't worry." She took off her coat and dropped it on the couch before hurrying off to the kitchen. "Must be nice to have a fridge with food in it, instead of body parts."

"Nice. Yeah…"

"Sure you don't want something a bit stronger, for the pain?" she asked innocently after putting the kettle on.

John sighed. Back on the booze, then. "No, Harry, it's fine. Knock yourself out."

That surprised Harry. She was used to John whinging about her drinking—something was off. "You okay, baby brother? I mean, aside from the obvious?"

"Bloody brilliant. I'm useless again."

"Nah, you're not," she said encouragingly, coming back into the parlor. John refused to look at anything besides his leg, propped up on pillows that Mrs. Hudson had undoubtedly put there for his comfort. "You'll have that thing off in two more weeks, they said, and then you'll be back chasing after him, just like always."

"This isn't just like always, Harry," John warned, but she brushed it off.

"You haven't been this bad since you got back from Afghanistan. In fact, I think you're worse—at least then you were stoic about it. It's written all over your face, John, how much you hate him."

"Then I shouldn't have to explain it to anyone."

They sat in silence for a few moments before Harry sighed and put a comforting hand on his knee. "John. I'm sorry."

"I know," he said. After a second, he put his hand over hers and rubbed it affectionately. "I know, Harry-o. It's not…well, it's fine. I brought it on myself."

"It's just…oh, _everyone _could see, when you were together, the way he said your name all the time, even when he was being an arrogant berk—it all changed so quickly. And you love him."

John frowned. Not right. "No."

"Well, I mean, you did."

"I _did_. Back when I could walk on my own," he said. "It's not—I mean, if I had good reason to believe that he really were still on my side, I wouldn't even be too upset about the leg. It was—it was just—the _woman_, Harry, he just shot her. His face didn't even move. He didn't _care._" He cradled his face in his hands and sighed. "I've…I'm sorry. I've just been thinking about it a lot. Every day. Anyway, I didn't call you to mope, I called to discuss something important."

"Hold on, let me get the tea," Harry said, leaving for the kitchen as the kettle whistled.

"While you're in there, pick up the envelope next to the fridge, if you could."

"Got it." She carried over two cups of tea and the envelope, twirling it in her hands after handing John his cup. The envelope was think and heavy, made of some sort of parchment, with a broken red wax seal on the back. "Can I open it?"

John nodded and drank. "Blimey, Harry, do you think you put enough milk in…?"

She ignored him and pulled out the letter inside. It was a small card, blank but for a small line of formal, stiff type that contrasted with the old-fashioned decadence of the paper.

_Come to tea_

_Buckingham Palace_

_You'll know when_

Her eyes widened. "The Queen wants you for tea, apparently," she joked before coughing nervously. "What's this, then?"

"My invitation. Sherlock and Moriarty are asking me to play, one more time. Evidently we're meeting at Buckingham Palace."

"You're not going—John, you're in no condition to see this people! If I were you, I'd run away, far away, where they'd never find me. I'd want to be left alone."

John smiled wryly. "Where could I run that Sherlock wouldn't find me?"

"Did you show Lestrade this?"

"Yep. He's got feelers out in every direction, trying to find where they ran off to. What they're planning next. I think it's to do with the royal family, somehow."

"Sherlock wants to kill the Queen?" Harry asked incredulously.

"Oh, I doubt it. This is more Moriarty's style, anyway—he'd be the one who wanted to rule. Sherlock just likes to be left to his own devices. This is just another way of terrorizing England, and they can't win this one." John paused. "I'm going, Harry. Whenever it is, whenever they strike, I've got to make sure they lose. If they don't, they will never stop."

Harry shook her head and said, "You're completely daft. What painkillers did they put you on?"

"Harry, _please_, listen. I've already decided—I'm not a physical match for them, not anymore, but they want me there and they know what Sherlock did to me, so they've factored it into their plan somehow."

"Can't you try and deduce what they're planning?"

"I could try—but to be honest, Harry, it's exhausting, trying to get in their heads. And I'm tired."

"But if you aren't prepared, and you're disadvantaged, you're basically going to your death!"

John didn't say anything.

"John. _John_. You can't mean…" Harry blinked rapidly a few times. "But—that's _absurd_! No, it's absurd! I'll—I'll lock you in here! I'll get a doctor to sign off on a mental hospital for you nutter and keep you there until this blows over! You're NOT going back to him."

"Harry."

"No, _John_. No. You meet them, you die—you're going to die, okay? And Sherlock's going to be the one to do it, don't you see? Don't you—" A few frustrated tears sprang from Harry's eyes, running down her red face. She tried to compose herself. "John, it's a suicide mission."

"If I don't try and finish them off, they'll kill a lot of people. I have a duty—"

"You left the service ages ago!"

"I have a duty, not only to this country, but to the people who were hurt because of me, because of my involvement with Sherlock. Like it or not, lots of bad things wouldn't have happened if it weren't for me, and I'm the only one who can do something about it." He sighed deeply. "In the event that something _does_ happen—and I'm not saying it _will_, Harry-o—I want you to know some things. First, I don't really have anything to give you, since my will is sparse enough as it is—I suppose you'd get some furniture if you wanted it…"

Harry shook her head. "No."

"Come on, love, it's just furniture," John said kindly, his tone softening. He reached for Harry's hand. "I want you to know that you're a brilliant sister, and I love you. I know we've had our rough spots, but you're a good woman, and I know whatever…problems you're dealing with…you'll get it all sorted. I believe in that." He chuckled. "I don't exactly have a good track record for believing in people. You'll have to do me proud. And if I don't succeed and Sherlock is still alive, or Moriarty or Moran, you need to leave the country for a bit. Get Clara to come with you, and make sure Mrs. Hudson is safe. And I suppose…that's all I had to say."

Harry gave him a watery smile and opened her mouth to say something before John's phone rang. He gave her an apologetic look and picked up. "John Watson speaking."

"John?"

"Mycroft, is that you? What's wrong? I usually get texts…"

"Yes, John, it's me. It seems you and I will be attending a rather formal party together soon."

"What do you mean?"

"I got an invitation today from my dear brother. Apparently I'm the only other man in England who was graced with the privilege of an invitation to the most dangerous tea party in Britain…."


	14. Chapter 14

"Greetings, citizens of England. I hope I'm not disturbing you in the middle of something important, but perhaps you'll forgive me…I _do _believe this is a bit more pressing at present…"

The voice, the face, was broadcast to every television, computer, and cell phone in the country at half six. Anything with a signal picked it up and played it. V for Vendetta fans went nuts for the first few minutes, expecting a V of sorts to call them to arms, but it quickly became apparent that this message was nothing of the sort.

"My name is James Moriarty, England, and I'm a simple man at heart, like the rest of you. I like being recognized for my abilities. I like getting what's due to me. I'm a hard worker and I love a good laugh. But unlike you, I have rather unorthodox methods of ensuring that I get exactly what I want…

"Another thing you should know, England, is that I am impossibly smarter and cleverer than any of you." The face on the screen, boyishly charming and apologetic, shrugged. "Sorry about that. Better luck next time.

"Anyway…now would be the point in the conversation, if we really _were _conversing, dear listeners, where you told me a little bit about yourselves. However, me being immensely intelligent and capable, I could find out anything I wanted about you with a few lines of computer code, so that's sort of moot, isn't it?'

He bit his lip, about to reveal some wonderful secret. "I _hope _I get to learn a little bit more about you, though. I think any sort of monarch should be well-informed." He blinked; he'd divulged something without meaning to. "Oh, did I mention? I intend to replace the Queen in a few weeks. The poor lady's getting a bit old for the job, don't you think? Out with the old and in with the new, right?"

He chuckled darkly and shook his head. "Oh, England, _England_, you really should see me in a crown. You'll get the chance, soon. This is just a little hello message to you all, letting you know about a change in management coming up. At present, there are only a few minor, bureaucratic details to be cleared up…

" 'Oh, Jim,' you'll be asking, 'how do you intend to take over England and become king? The Queen is guarded by the best security in the whole of Europe!' Well, you'd be right, listeners—but who do you think _owns_ the security? I own everything, England—_everything_. You've just been too unexceptional to notice it. I own every single one of you already, and if you don't I'm right, you're thicker than I thought…and that's a disappointment to me, England. That's a disappointment to your future king.

"You'll also be asking about the order of succession—after all, there are others ready to take the Queen's place. Well, of _course _there are. That doesn't mean they'll be…available for the job when I get to it. And you'll be asking why I even want to be King when we're in a constitutional monarch and the royals have no actual power. To that I say—_why not_? I didn't necessarily say I wouldn't take care of Parliament, too…

"Anyway, that's all I had to say, England. Don't worry about how it's going to happen—just be ready when it does. And of _course_, double and triple the security on all the royal family. I told you, I love a good laugh…

The man faced the camera directly and smiled. "Now, I'd like to address two very important men before I go. You might not know this, England, but you're not really run by Parliament as much as you think you are. No, there's a _man_, a very quiet, secretive, fat man who runs everything behind the scenes. Mr. Mycroft Holmes, I'm speaking to you now. You know where I am now, of course, and you also know it's useless at this point in the game to try and get me. I'll just hand off the torch to that delicious brother of yours… So, Mr. Holmes, I assume you've received your invitation to my little party. Your brother will be there, and my friends are coming, too. Dress sharp—there'll be cake, so don't fret."

He licked his lips. "And Mr. John Watson—hello, Johnny. I understand we might have to take your new…disability…into consideration. Don't worry—the party will be wheelchair accessible, if you want Mycroft to push you along. Don't hurt yourself getting over here, love.

"Oh, and Johnny? _He's _going to be there, but please try and control your temper. You're going to be surrounded by very esteemed company, and you wouldn't want to throw a scene in front of Her Majesty."

Moriarty smiled. "Byeeeeeee…..!"

The screens of Britain flickered off, leaving a confused nation in their wake.

* * *

Thousands of miles away, in a warehouse in Belgium, Moriarty guffawed and slammed the laptop case down. "Bloody brilliant," he said. "I haven't had this much fun in ages."

Almost immediately, someone was behind him, pressing lips to his throat. "_That_," Sherlock whispered, "was delicious."

"You're beginning to sound like me—did you notice?"

"Should I start giving you a nickname?" He kissed the edge of Moriarty's jawbone. "Jimmy and Sherly…"

"That's vomitous. If you call me Jimmy again, I'll have Moran make you into a suit, and I'll have no one to call my queen."

Sherlock sniffed. "_Queen_? Now that's just insulting."

"No, it isn't. You're prettier than me, and _clearly _I'm going to be king. Consider yourself lucky you get a title at all."

"But _queen_, Jim…"

"Oh, details…we'll discuss them later. Get back to work."

"Yes, _Your_ _Majesty_."

* * *

John watched the transmission from the pub, clutching a pint with a blank expression as Moriarty taunted him from the screen, interrupting a very important football match.

Well. Wouldn't be long, then.

He gulped down the pint, put a few quid on the table, and grabbed his cane. After a small struggle getting off the bar stool, he landed clumsily on the floor and silently picked himself up, wincing as he limped away.

Wouldn't be long at all.

* * *

"Lestrade, you've got a call—from Her Majesty's secret service, it looks like."

Lestrade rolled his eyes and didn't bother looking up from his desk. "This isn't a bloody James Bond movie, Anderson—I'm a bit inundated with work after that bloody transmission…"

"Boss, I'm serious—they're on line 4."

He grumbled and picked up the phone, which had previously been ringing nonstop since Moriarty's message. "Gregson Lestrade's office… You're _really_—blimey, I had no idea… Of course, I'll do anything to help… The Queen asked specifically for—_bloody hell_…. Sorry, just… Yes, I suppose you could say I have experience with him. Yes, I'll be over right away. But listen, you should know, if he's really targeting Her Majesty, doubling security measures really won't do anything, sir. He has too much information…"

* * *

Mycroft watched Moriarty ramble on calmly from his desk, hands folded under his chin. Watched the message again. Smiled.

There had been too much _he'd _been wrong about, but there were a blessed few things he'd gotten right. So this was happening.

"Anthea," he called out into the front office. "I've received confirmation of my invitation to a very important occasion. We're going to need that champagne I called for. Do mind it, dear—it was rather expensive."


	15. Chapter 15

**As we go into this chapter, keep an eye out for everything. Go back and look at the last chapter, too. I've tried to put some clues in these chapters, and all chapters prior, if you know where to look. It all depends on who you believe in, in the end, readers. That influences where it all goes.**

**Oh, I'm so excited! Enjoy, and leave your best guesses as to who to believe and what's really going on in the comments! I'd love to see what you think!**

* * *

The day the Queen was taken, Jim Moriarty didn't commandeer all the televisions in England. Like Sherlock, he didn't like repetition. Repetition was reserved for people with no imagination.

Cheekily, all he'd done was posted a picture online on some innocuous Facebook page—a picture of him, smiling broadly, next to an old woman who looked a bit beaten and half-asleep. The comment under the picture was a simple, "Guess who I'm with?"

But word got around with 37 seconds of the picture's posting, not to mention the utter panic and disarray all of Britain's security went into as soon as the Palace had been breached.

The entire country went haywire after that. People were yelling and shouting in the streets. Every single channel in the world focused in on the tragedy in London. Somehow, and no one seemed to know how, a crazy Irishman who'd infiltrated their lives a few weeks prior had gotten in past loads of guards and codes and locked doors and was currently sitting in her private parlor, taking silly pictures.

Some people thought it was a conspiracy—that there was no forced entry because somehow, the British government wanted this to happen.

Some people thought the photo was a fake, that Moriarty was a brilliant hacker who'd photoshopped the picture.

Some people.

John had been at Tesco, getting milk, ironically enough. The store erupted into panic. A black car was waiting outside, next to a man with an umbrella.

"I rather think it's time to go, don't you?" Mycroft asked, opening the door for John.

John stayed where he was, leaning heavily on his cane and holding a bag of milk with the other hand. "He went and did it, then?"

"Are you ready?"

John abandoned the milk on the sidewalk and nodded. "I assume you've brought a few more personal effects, though. I just have my gun."

"Oh, just the usual. Plus a little liquid refreshment for the party. I always try and bring gifts to those, and I know what the Queen likes." Mycroft looked sadly at John's leg—it had been out of the cast and the brace for a while now, but if you looked closely enough, you could see that it bent slightly inward at the knee. Like so many battle wounds, it hadn't healed exactly right. "How are you feeling?"

"Like I'm going to die tonight."

"Funnily enough, Dr. Watson, I have the same instinct. Come on, then. We have an engagement." He ushered John into the car and told the driver where to go, and the two men sat in silence in the back of the car.

Mycroft tapped his umbrella impatiently at the back of the seat in front of him before asking, "Your leg, is it…"

"I can walk on it." John sighed. "Mycroft, why are you coming to this? Haven't you figured it all out by now? Couldn't you have stopped this from happening?"

"You saw the transmission. Moriarty himself said it was useless to try."

"I don't believe that. Not _you_, Mycroft Holmes, with his finger in every pie. You could have done something."

"Let it be made abundantly clear," Mycroft said in a clipped tone, "that I have taken every possible precaution for this night. I hope you've done the same."

He snorted. "Right."

"We're about to walk into a minefield, John Watson. I think it best you don't consider me your enemy, not at this stage. There's a great chance that we'll be each other's only hopes of escaping unscathed. I do believe, to preserve the order of the universe, there must be _one _Holmes brother you can trust."

John nodded and took it into consideration. They didn't say anything more until the car pulled up to what John assumed was some sort of back entrance to Buckingham Palace. He made to open to car door before Mycroft blocked his hand and said urgently, "John. There are things you must know—things you have to count on if you mean to survive tonight. I know you're aiming to kill my brother…"

"If you're going to try and convince me otherwise, Mycroft, I'm sorry, but it won't work."

"I only mean to say—just watch carefully. Everything that goes on. It's what Sherlock would do if he were here with us."

"I don't want to imagine what Sherlock would do."

"You must. Moriarty will be high on victory, and people who are high on victory make mistakes. They slip up. Don't go into this thinking you've lost, or that you've only one goal. Go in trying to live, and that will make you think like him."

John stared hard at Mycroft before nodding once and getting out of the car.

The two men made their way slowly up stairs and down halls that Mycroft seemed to know, and John followed, with his metal cane hitting the ground with loud smacks that made him cringe internally. After ten minutes of walking, Mycroft turned to him apologetically and said, "No elevators round here—a bit dated, I'm afraid. But don't fret, Watson, I know this part of the building rather intimately."

Finally they made it to a room guarded by a huge, hulking blond man John recognized as Sebastian Moran.

Evidently, Mycroft recognized him too. "Colonel Moran. Kept out of the party, now, were we?"

Moran grumbled. "I'm to search the both of you."

"Well, that's too bloody bad, now isn't it?" John laughed. "You know we're both armed, and you're armed, and they're armed. If you try and take our weapons, we'll just turn around and leave, thanks very much, and I don't think your boss will like that."

"Let them in, Seb—it's time," a high voice called from the room, and John's skin involuntarily began to crawl. Seb nodded once and opened the door, letting a cheery Mycroft in followed by John.

The lights were all off, letting watery streams of daylight in through the curtains to dimly illuminate the room. Shadows flickered everywhere. Moriarty sat, looking pleasant, at an ornate table set for five. Tea and cakes were all set out for the guests, with a china teapot in the middle next to a silver bowl or sugar. "Sherlock made tea," he said cheekily. "He never does, but he did today. How thoughtful. I think he was trying to impress our guest."

The only other person at the table, in a rich red dressing gown with grey hair bedraggled over her face, sat silently, rocking a bit back and forth in her chair.

"Well? Aren't you going to greet your queen?"

Mycroft bowed at the waist. "Afternoon, Your Majesty. I assure you, you have nothing to worry about."

The Queen said nothing, eyeing Moriarty with a steely gaze. Moriarty only smiled with a mouthful of pastry and said, "You can talk, ma'am. It's a party after all."

The Queen swallowed and said in a frail but unwavering voice, "It's good to see you again, Mycroft. I trust there is an explanation for all of this."

"All in good time, ma'am. This is my friend and colleague, Dr. John H. Watson, formerly a captain of the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers."

"How do you do, Your Majesty?" John said, bowing as well.

"Captain Watson? I've heard a lot about you today."

"Yes, she has. She's been so excited for this little get-together!" Moriarty squealed, giggling and spitting pastry on the tablecloth. "Mycroft, is that a gift I spy in your bag, next to the inevitable cache of fancy guns?"

Mycroft cleared his throat. "It's customary, I think, to bring a gift for the host." He pulled the bottle of champagne out and handed it over to Moriarty, who simply stared up at him.

"Do you think I'm that thick?" he said. "Do you really think—oh, Mycroft, you really must do better than _that_."

"I'm not sure what you mean."

"If you think I'm touching that bottle, then you're even more stupid that Captain Watson. And more useless. And that's saying something."

Mycroft frowned. "What do you want me to do with it, then?"

"I'll take it," a deep voice said from the shadows, and Sherlock Holmes emerged, hands clasped behind his back.

John's own hands clenched tightly around his walking stick. The memories of the last time he saw him were thrown into sharp, sickeningly accurate relief.

He repressed the urge to draw his gun on sight. Instead he said nothing and glared, stone-faced, at him. Sherlock, as usual, betrayed nothing with his expression. He nodded in greeting. "Mycroft. John…"

"Brother." Mycroft extended the champagne over the table to Sherlock, who eyed the bottle warily. John could see the familiar gears of his head working, trying to deduce, and he finally grabbed the bottle.

He was half afraid of the universe falling apart when Sherlock touched the bottle, some sort of sedative on the bottle, but Mycroft had touched it—this was Moriarty being suspicious.

Sherlock raised an eyebrow. "Shall I pop the bubbly now, or later?"

"Later, I think. After our host has explained the proceedings." Mycroft propped his umbrella against the wall and took a seat next to the Queen. "If you don't mind, ma'am, I'd like to enjoy the honor of your proximity."

The Queen shook her head. "Not at all."

Moriarty was already sitting at the head of the table, and Sherlock took his seat across from the Queen. That left the only empty seat next to him.

_No. NO._

John fought against all the nerves in his body and slowly approached the seat next to Sherlock. He had a bit of trouble maneuvering the chair out from under the table, and Sherlock made to pull it out for him.

"_Don't!" _he hissed at Sherlock, shoving his hand away. Sherlock frowned and pulled his hand away as John pulled the chair out and threw his weight into it.

"John, I thought I made it abundantly clear that bad manners would not be tolerated," Moriarty scolded. He leaned over conspiratorially to the Queen and fake-whispered, "He and Sherlock are having a bit of a tiff. Sherlock, you see, did something a bit nasty the last time they—"

"Yes, all right, Moriarty, we get it," John said, staring at his plate. "Just—get on with it, will you? Why are we all here?"

Jim folded his hands and sighed dreamily. "So eager to do away with social niceties. Well. Since you asked, I'll simply tell you— the Queen is dying today." He bowed his head to her. "Sorry, ma'am."

"I'm afraid I can't let that happen," Mycroft said softly.

"Exactly—that's why you're here, dear. That's why the both of you are. You see, I think it's time we put all our cards on the table, once and for all. It's only fair, really." Moriarty stretched back in his chair. "And I confess, it's going to be a bit flattering to me, so bear with my self-indulgence. I've been planning this little party for years. _Years_, you can't imagine, how long. Let's just say that…little Jim, growing up, always had a dream of having people bow to him. And having people bow to you in a criminal empire that spanned the world by nineteen—did I tell you I was a criminal king by nineteen? Impressive, yes?—gets sort of boring when you're only the king of sewer rats, and I do have a fondness for crowns out of real jewels. So, how does a lonely consulting criminal maximize his fun and start his path to tearing a country apart and building it back up in his image?" Moriarty blinked flirtatiously. "Well, I simply had to get _you_, my dear Mycroft. And you know I've been trying to for ages."

Mycroft shifted in his seat. "You've been monitored for a time, yes."

"Oh, I know. But in order to get you, I needed someone close, someone on the inside. At the same time, I was looking for a partner to help me run things—I can only do so much, Mycroft. I can do a whole lot, but not _everything_. Especially not the dirty work, and Seb's fine for dirty work, but nothing intelligent. You know how brutes work; you have enough at your disposal. I started looking into Sherlock when he was rather young, to be honest. In fact, I might have gotten him a teensy bit involved with one of my smaller enterprises when he was in his early twenties. With racing minds, geniuses do tend to go toward that sort of thing."

John blinked in surprise. "You—you got Sherlock addicted? To cocaine, all those years ago?'

He smiled, toadlike, and said, "I didn't _force _him into anything. I just sent a few influential people his way when he was in uni… The original plan, actually, was to send him into such a nasty state that his brother would get involved, but by then he'd be in my custody and we'd have to negotiate for Sherlock's safety."

"Sher—" John swallowed his name before he finished it—he didn't want to address him. He didn't even look at him. "You're all right with this? You knew that Moriarty did that to you—and you still joined him?"

"I'm a persuasive man, Johnny," Moriarty replied for him. "And he knew what he was getting into when he joined me. Don't try and appeal for his soul now, John. You know where it stands."

"I'm _not_," John seethed. Sherlock only stared at his plate, blank-faced. "I'm not saving anything."

Sherlock smiled. "Destroyed. Like I predicted."

John chose to ignore that.

"Anyway, after the whole coke fiasco, I had to try again. But I gave Sherly a little bit of time to grow—I was very patient. I knew he was the key. And then he surprised me, at the pool: he didn't just offer himself as the chink in the British government's armor, he offered himself as a partner. And we've been together ever since!" he said with relish. "Which brings us to you, Mycroft Holmes. I'm sorry to say, but the only way I get what I want today is if some people die. And that's how the day's going to go. Sherlock here is going to kill the British government, and Johnny is going to kill the Queen."


	16. Chapter 16

"I'm sorry, _what_?" John spluttered. "I'm not—I'm not killing the Queen! That's bloody ridiculous! Even if the Queen were to die today—sorry, ma'am, this is purely hypothetical—why would _I _be the one to do it?"

Moriarty shrugged. "It's more fun that way. Don't think you're too good to do such a thing, Johnny—you forget that you've killed people, same as we have. You have more blood on your hands than Sherlock over here."

John glared murderously at Sherlock and said, "I think that's a bit different."

"No, it isn't. You got that blood on your hands in a battlefield and so did Sherlock—Sherlock's battlefield is just a mental one, not a desert in Afghanistan. And speaking of hypotheticals, you came here with the express purpose of killing as many of us as you could, did you not, my dear?' Jim folded his hands under his chin. "You're just the same as we are."

"_No_," he said, standing up from the table with a mighty clutter. "Don't pull that with me, that villain-from-crap-telly act. There is _no _similarity between us, Moriarty, not a single one. We don't even have humanity in common, because you, undoubtedly, are a _monster_. The only thing we have in common is Sherlock, but those are for entirely different reasons."

"Those reasons brought you here in the first place," Moriarty pointed out. "In any case, we have work to do. Mycroft Holmes, I assume you're quite against my whole plan to take over the country and kill you?"

"I confess to being in opposition, yes."

"No chance of cooperation."

"None at all, I'm afraid.

"Well, let the fratricide commence." Moriarty nodded to Sherlock. "Go on, my dear. I think you've waited long enough."

"Quite right." Sherlock lazily pulled a pistol out of the breast pocket of his suit. "Sorry about this, brother."

Mycroft smirked. "What? No speeches? No elaborate explanations of your hatred for me, brother?"

"Are they necessary?"

"No, but they'd be quite entertaining. Allow a dead man his simple joys."

John tensed in his seat. "Sherlock."

"What?" he asked, not bothering to turn to face him. "Are you his last appeal for life? You know he's too proud to beg for it himself."

"What you're about to do, you're going to regret for the rest of your sorry days."

"If breaking every bone in your leg and killing a woman in cold blood doesn't keep me up nights, I doubt this will. And according to _your_ plan, I'll only have a few more minutes to be sorry for it until you shoot my brains out." He aimed the gun at Mycroft's chest. "Sorry, _dear_."

And then John Watson properly lost it. He launched himself out of his chair and with the precision of someone who'd had to manage with a cane for some time, he knocked the gun out of Sherlock's hand with his metal cane and used his left arm to lock around Sherlock's neck and push him to the floor.

"Mycroft, _RUN_!" he growled uselessly as he ground Sherlock's face into the floor. He dug in his pocket for his gun, trying to get it out while Sherlock struggled against him. He only had a few seconds before Sherlock would right himself and—

_CRACK! _ There it was—a blow to the leg again, not enough to break it but enough for it to hurt, threw John to the side, winded. Then Sherlock was on top of him, pummeling wildly. "_Out—of—my—way—you—useless—mongrel—"_

"Boys," Moriarty whined from the table. "Boys, will you stop? Sherlock, I paid for that suit…"

John could feel blood filling his mouth, but he kept his eyes focused on Sherlock as he continued to punch. Sherlock's eyes were wild with anger and blind rage, and for some odd reason, John was relieved, because at least there was one emotion left in Sherlock's body that he could still count on to work in his favor.

"Go—on—" John croaked as the blows continued to land. He struggled against Sherlock, trying to push him off. "_Kill_—me—then! I know—you _want_ to!"

Sherlock stopped, his fist hanging in mid-air, and his irises clouded. For a stomach-churning second, John saw him grab the gun that had fallen to the floor, and he knew what was coming, what was about to happen—and he was about to die at the hand of Sherlock Holmes, and he was almost_glad_—

And then Sherlock swiveled, pinning John's arm to the ground, and concentrated for a moment before firing off the gun straight into Mycroft's chest.

John panted in shock on the ground underneath Sherlock's chest as Mycroft looked surprised, wheezing at the force of the bullet. He looked down at his grey suit and the entry site, already sticky with red, and groaned thoughtfully, before dropping to the floor.

"Well, one down," Moriarty said. "Finally. But he did miss the cake…"

John howled underneath Sherlock and kneed him hard in the small of the back, moving Sherlock enough to allow him to sit up and wrap his arms around Sherlock's neck from behind. At least on the floor, his leg didn't count for anything. "_I—will—KILL YOU—Sherlock Holmes!_"

Sherlock choked and spluttered, pulling uselessly at John's headlock until John felt huge arms pull at his middle and drag him away. He clawed blindly behind him to get the man to let go, but Sebastian Moran pulled him off and threw him against the wall. John heard his back crack and knew that something important had just broken, but he was too dizzy to figure out what.

Moran moved to strike him, but Sherlock slapped his arm down with surprising strength. "We agreed," he snarled. "He's _mine_!"

"Settle down, all of you," Moriarty ordered sharply. Something in his tone, which John could only glean from bloodied ears and a hazy brain, told him he was done joking. "ENOUGH!"

Sherlock straightened up, wiping blood out from under his nose and fixing his shirt. "I'm tying you up."

"Like hell you are!"

"I said ENOUGH," Moriarty roared over the table. "I'm finished with you acting like cavemen. If you please, gentlemen, sit back at the table. _Sherlock_."

Sherlock swallowed. "You're right. I'm sorry, Jim." He cleared his throat and offered his hand to John to help him up.

John looked at the hand. Thought about it. Chose to spit on it instead, pink-tinged with blood.

It was so _absurd_, so unbelievably _absurd_, that they go back to this—that they insist on pretending that everything was all right when Sherlock's brother lay dead on the floor, blood pouring out of him, not two minutes gone. Were Sherlock and Jim _used _to this—to dining surrounded by blood and corpses?

John thought he would throw up. Instead, he dragged himself along the floor, biting his cheek to hold in grunts of pain, and pulled himself back onto his chair.

Moriarty poured cups of tea for everyone. "If we could all just settle down for one moment-you've made quite an embarrasment out of yourself in front of our esteemed company. I'm sorry for it, ma'am," he mock-apologized. "Now, if we could all just behave like something other than animals and drink this nice tea that Sherlock prepared for us, that would be lovely."

He offered a tea cup, only one, to Sherlock. "I rather think he should get the first cup, don't you all?"

No one at the table spoke. John felt something change from where he sat-the mood of the room had changed so quickly from violence to calm.

The calm before the storm, perhaps? What had Mycroft told him? _Pay attention to everything_.

Sherlock took the cup cautiously, nodded in gratitude, and said, "Of course." Then, as nonchalantly as he could, he sipped away at the teacup until it was empty. He set it down on the table with a smirk, strangely proud of what he'd done.

"Of course." Moriarty echoed and flexed his fingers. "You stuck to it, I must say. It's a damn shame. If it's all the same to you, I won't be drinking the tea. No, I think I'll watch. I think I'll indulge in Mycroft's parting gift, actually. Thanks for testing it for me, by the way."

"John," Sherlock ordered. "Fetch him a glass."

"I'm not bloody fetching _anything_."

"Your Majesty, _if _you wouldn't mind…" Sherlock said, gesturing to the champagne flutes on the other side of the room. The Queen looked at him like he was insane, but after he shooed her along, she rose with dignity and slowly made her way, hobbling the whole time, to the table with the flutes.

"That's cute," Moriarty said. "A final touch. Making the Queen serve me before she dies. Now, John, in case you didn't hear, you'll be killing the Queen today. I'm sure you're wondering how I'm going to get you to do it, and I must say, you're not going to like it one bit. And neither will Sherly, but by now I know that Sherlock's already figured it out, so I'm going to explain it to you."

"Jim—"

"DON'T—_DON'T call me that_," he shouted at Sherlock. "I don't want to hear that name in your mouth again, understand? You little _bitch_. You genuinely thought you could do it, didn't you? You know you're going to _die_ without succeeding? Sherlock, I'm going to _laugh _over your body and there'll be nothing you can do about it. I will _ruin _your very skin."

John's head was spinning. "What—"

"_Shut up_," Sherlock spat at him. "I swear to you, John, if you want to live another meaningless day, you will _shut your filthy mouth_ and _let the man talk._"

Moriarty breathed in for a few seconds and let it out. "That's more like it. More in character. Anyway, John, the reason you will be killing the Queen today is because I will be offering you a choice. Either you kill Her Majesty…or I let Sherlock die today."

John scoffed. "_Let _him die? What do you mean?"

"I'm quite sorry to say," Moriarty said, "that he just poisoned himself quite thoroughly a few moments ago."

John glanced at Sherlock, who didn't show a single sign of being poisoned. He looked the same as he had. "I find that hard to believe. What, with the tea? He knew what was in that cup."

"Are you _really _that thick? Do I have to explain everything to you?" Moriarty rolled his eyes. "You utter clod. You _twit_. You're both twits, the pair of you. Sherlock had his own little scheme today, John, and it sure didn't involve me. He made a nice, special tea, and he thought only I would be stupid enough to indulge in it. It's almost sad, how simple he thought doing away with me would be. In the end, it's almost too cute, that I don't even have to finish him off before the Queen dies."

"It doesn't matter," John said firmly. "Even if you're right, I wouldn't do it."

Moriarty smiled. "What? You'd let him die? Foaming at the mouth, right in front of you?"

"He deserves it." John sighed deeply. "I'm just sorry…sorry I didn't do it myself." Then he eyed Sherlock directly. "You deserve this. If he's right, you deserve every moment of it. You sick bastard, you really do."

Sherlock frowned. "John…"

"No, I mean this. I mean this—you listen, because if he's right, you're not long for this world. I came here tonight to make sure that you _died_, Sherlock—and do you know what that means? Do you realize that that's something I'd never want in my ordinary life? You made me—so—_happy_, once, and then you broke every single piece of that." He stood up shakily. "You're a killer, a killer of the lowest order. You're worse than people who kill for fun—worse than Moriarty. You're infinitely worse, because you do it out of boredom. You do it because someone made you do it, and—and you made me the same way. You—_made _me want to kill you, kill Moriarty, and you're going to _do _it, too, because I won't leave this place unless I shoot Moriarty and Moran in the face myself or they shoot me, whichever comes first. You _made me want to kill, Sherlock Holmes_. And—" John felt his voice about to break, because Sherlock _still wasn't emoting_, and his eyes were just as blank as ever, and that _killed him_. "And I think I'm going to follow you down to hell for that."

The whole room was silent, except for the clinking of glass as the Queen of England shakily grabbed a champagne flute.

Sherlock cleared his throat, stood up from the table, and said, "I think I'll kill you first." And John expected the punch, welcomed it even, as it landed clumsily across his jaw and sent him stumbling back into the table of glasses, which shattered and feel around him as he hit the floor.

Moriarty snorted. "I'll drink to that."

And when he wrenched the cork from the champagne bottle, several things happened at once—but the first thing that happened was a huge explosion.

John shielded his face on instinct from the blast, which filled the room with heat, and in a split second had the sense to grab the Queen by the ankle and yank her down to the floor as the fire from the explosion billowed up to the ceiling and blasted it apart. Bits of plaster fell on top of the, filling the room with a white, powdery dust. John could still hear the crinkle of flames on the edges of the room through his pierced hearing, which wobbled at a high frequency in his head from the sound of the blast.

He squinted at the carnage of the room, which was hard to filter through the dust and plaster and fire, and groaned at the pain in his back. He could feel where glass had shredded his skin.

There were indistinct mumbling noises that he tried to tune into, and he got the feeling that he should try and leave the room that was slowly burning.

There—the loud crack of a gun, and the immediate pain that followed, somewhere that was already on fire, somewhere already burning…

Then there was the sound of another gunshot, and some huge shadow was falling with a thud on the floor, and John strained through his poor vision to see what was going on before collapsing.

"John…_John_…"

He moaned, pushing a hand out blindly.

"John, listen to me—John, you _must _listen—can you hear me?"

He felt light touches on his forehead, and something sticky—was he bleeding on his forehead? When had that happened? The same fingers feathered over to his shoulder and back and leg, all the while someone was repeating his name.

"…John…John, _please_, don't die, not after all this, _don't_..."

"He's fine, Sherlock—you should really be concerning yourself with Her Majesty."

Familiar, impossible voice. John keened when pressure was applied to his side. "_No_…"

There was breath, relief. "John."

"Since you're not going to see to her, I will," the voice said, exasperated. He could feel the burning ground shifting under him as someone's weight moved over. "Unconscious. Can you…?"

"…I can try. John, first."

"John is hardly more important than the monarch of a nation."

"He is infinitely more important-he's the reason for everything. I don't have long, though…"

John's consciousness dipped somewhere red and muted, but he pushed it back to the surface, gasping for air.

"Why on earth did you drink that bloody tea?"

"I thought I still had something to work with. I thought if I did, he'd follow suit. That was plan one. Not that _you _were any help. You were supposed to take care of Her bloody Majesty!"

"I don't know if you cared to notice, brother, but I was a bit occupied, being shot in the chest."

John briefly wondered if he was already in hell.

His fears were confirmed, he thought, when he felt his body being dragged along the floor. He screamed in earnest and threw his arms clumsily out to stop it.

"Bullet wound grazing the side, bit of plaster hit him on the head, glass wounds on the back, burned on the bad leg," a voice assessed for him, sounding desperate. "Mycroft, he doesn't have any longer than I do."

"Then I suggest, for all our sakes, that you carry him if you can."

"I _would _if I could, Mycroft," the voice spat, "but in case you haven't noticed, I'm not exactly long for this world, either!"

"The trap-door, Sherlock, was the _original_ plan."

"The trap-door is currently covered with the body of an Indian colonel and neither of us has the strength to move him, so I suggest you call for back-up."

The other voice—familiar, impossible—sighed. There was only silence, the crackle of flames, and fingers feathering lightly over John's side, where a fire was beginning to sear through the numbness of his shock. "John…John, can you hear me?"

He moaned when pressure was applied to his side, whimpering and crying out, and a shadow hung over his closed eyelids as someone leaned over him and whispered, "It's all right, don't…don't _do_that, John, you're going to be fine."

"Phoned Lestrade. They were waiting outside, anyway. Sherlock, you must go."

"_NO._"

"Lestrade will cuff you within minutes if you don't run."

"If I run, I'm implicated."

"Too late for that—and if you stay, you'll never see him again."

The same fingers—cool, sticky, wet with blood—rested on John's head. "I doubt he'd be too displeased. I'm not leaving him."

"Sherlock, be reasonable."

"I'm _not_—I'm not leaving, do you understand? I can't—I _couldn't_… Not after… Mycroft, _do_something, don't let them take me just yet, they can do what they bloody well please but only after I see to it that John is all right."

He could practically hear Mycroft's frown. "Sentiment."

"Why else am I here?" Sherlock chuckled darkly. "After all this time…"

He coughed. John could feel the vibrations through his chest, and he winced as they shook him.

"You need to see a doctor."

"So do you. Two broken ribs, I think."

"I'll live. You might not. If you can, take the back window exit—I have a car waiting. I'd say, if you don't exert yourself, you have fifteen minutes."

"Does the car know where to go?"

"Yes."

More silence. Sense, sense was swimming somewhere far away, and John could hear but not reason, could not comprehend.

"No. I'll stay—he's not going to care, if I don't make it. You heard what he said."

"You made him say it. John will never forgive you if you die out of melodramatic shows of guilt. Get out of here," Mycroft barked, and the shadow was looming over him again. John longed to push it away, claw at it.

"_John_… John, I'm sorry. Forgive me."

"Sherlock, now. They're coming."

The shadow flitted away from John's eyelids and the pressure was gone, and the sounds of men trooping in drowned out the sound of someone climbing through broken glass and escaping.


	17. Chapter 17

_Mycroft Holmes was not, primarily, the British government. Sherlock might like to joke that he was, and while he wasn't necessarily incorrect, it was more accurate to say that Mycroft was a sentinel._

_He watched. He did not rule._

_It wasn't necessarily incorrect to say that Mycroft and Sherlock hated each other—they did, with the enduring rage born of the cradle. But Sherlock, being prone to histrionics, tended to exaggerate their level of disgust for each other. Of course Sherlock hated him—but he also had enough common sense to come to him when he felt the need._

_Which he did, two days after the incident with the cabbie, as Mycroft knew he would. He was waiting, long legs propped up on Mycroft's desk, when he came in for work that day with a fresh mug of coffee._

_"Apparently, I've got a fan," Sherlock said by way of greeting. "A Moriarty, if the cabbie wasn't mistaken."_

_Mycroft raised his eyebrows questioningly before sitting at his desk and taking a thoughtful sip of tea. "There are two types of fans," he said finally. "The first—my bedroom's just a cab ride away, and the second—catch me before I kill again."_

_Sherlock smirked. "Have you ever had a fan before, Mycroft?"_

_He chose not to answer. "I assume you've done as much research as you can and come up with next to nothing, or else you wouldn't be here."_

_"Of course."_

_"And what have you gleaned?"_

_"The websites, the underground chatrooms, and the homeless network only have whispers, fragments," Sherlock said fitfully. "He—if he in fact is male—is some sort of facilitator of crimes. He has a finger in every pie, and if you contact him, he can get anything done for you."_

_"And why is he a fan of you?"_

_"You're supposed to tell me. I assume you have a file."_

_Mycroft smiled. He stood up to check the mahogany bookcases behind his desk, flipping through name after name of files that he considered important enough to be in the immediate vicinity. "How's your new flatmate, by the way?"_

_"Watson? Perfectly adequate."_

_"Hasn't run screaming from your severed heads? Puts up with your violin at 3 in the morning?"_

_"Not yet," Sherlock replied. He smiled to himself. "I think he rather likes it."_

_Mycroft hummed. "Strange man."_

_"I like him."_

_"High praise, coming from Sherlock Holmes."_

_"I think he might be some sort of conductor for me—someone came in yesterday with a lost safety deposit box and I solved it in minutes after John brought me tea. That's unheard of."_

_"Hmm. He sounds useful."_

_"Could be."_

_"And he killed a man for you."_

_"No concrete proof of that."_

_Mycroft hummed again. "You're lucky I chose to overlook it. I think John Watson could be the very making of you, little brother. I hope you don't mind—I've started to keep a watch out for him."_

_"Unnecessary. I can ensure no harm comes to him."_

_"It's just a precaution, Sherlock. Ah, here we are—James Moriarty. Though I should warn you, Sherlock, you're not going to like what you see." He passed the file, already thick with clippings and papers, over to Sherlock, who immediately opened it and digested it. "You're right—he considers himself a consulting criminal. The very mirror image of you. However, he's been doing more than just ruling an underground world of crime, creating a web… He's been keeping tabs on you since you were in uni."_

_Sherlock found the important papers, labeled neatly in the front. Medical records, charts of people with names he remembered dimly from a time he didn't want to remember. "So," he said coldly. "So. It was him, then."_

_"It would seem so. Though, I hate to remind you, he did not force the needle into your arm. You made the choice."_

_"He put the choice in my way."_

_"A technicality. The bottom line, Sherlock, is that he's been watching you for a long time and he wants you."_

_"Why?"_

_"Isn't it obvious?"_

_Sherlock took a second to think about it before shutting the file. "Transparent."_

_"Don't let it bruise your ego," Mycroft said. "You're quite important to him, too. I imagine he could use a man of your intellect. You're just not the primary target."_

_"If he knew anything about us, he'd know that the way to hurt you would not be through me."_

_"My dear brother, don't be so absurd. That's the _only _way he could ever force my hand on any matter." Mycroft sat and leaned back in his chair. "But what he won't be counting on, I think, is our ability to collaborate when the situation requires it."_

_"Does the situation require it now?" Sherlock asked._

_"It might."_

_Sherlock paused. "He'll be making another move, soon. Fans always do."_

_"We can expect it."_

_Sherlock nodded. "I need…to think about this. I'll contact you."_

_"I'm sure you will. Where are you off to now?"_

_Sherlock grabbed his coat off the chair and made to leave. "Dinner at Angelo's. To celebrate John moving in."_

_"Quaint. Do keep an eye on him, baby brother. I'd hate to see you get your heart broken."_

_Sherlock scoffed. "I've been reliably informed I don't have one."_

_"We both know that's not true. Send my regards to Angelo. And Sherlock?" Mycroft said earnestly. "Be careful."_

* * *

_"She was employed by a mysterious 'M,' " Sherlock explained, looking thoroughly exhausted after the night at the Chinese circus. "My network informs me that she was killed a few hours later. Does this count as the next move?"_

_"I see no reason why it shouldn't. Moriarty, then—he'll be coming out of the shadows soon, I'm sure. We need to prepare," Mycroft sighed._

_"What did you have in mind?"_

_"There will come a time, I think, when he will reveal himself to you and warn you to leave him alone. He wants you to continue to investigate him so he can trap you and lure me in—you must change the game before he does. If at all possible, you must kill him when he does reveal himself."_

_Sherlock shook his head. "He's too thorough. I imagine snipers will be present. Some sort of protection."_

_"And insurance—he'll try and use leverage to get you to comply."_

_"John?"_

_"We can assume."_

_Sherlock sighed deeply and rested his head in his hands. "Mycroft…how am I supposed to fight something I can't even see?"_

_"It's actually quite easy. I do it every day. Now, what are his advantages?"_

_"He knows us. He knows our weak points. He has money, security, power behind him."_

_"Our advantages?"_

_"Collective intelligence and knowing what's coming." Sherlock's eyes flicked up and stared Mycroft down. "I know what you're going to ask me to do. I won't do it."_

_Mycroft opened his mouth to argue, but thought the better of it. Instead, he asked, "Would you like to tell me why you felt inclined to interrupt John's date tonight?"_

_"It was for a case."_

_"Would you like to tell me why you feel inclined to interrupt the majority of his dates?" Mycroft smirked. "Your attachment is showing, little brother. Didn't you assume he was gay when you first met?"_

_"I…assessed his interests incorrectly. Possibly. Still not ruling it out."_

_"You should be embarrassed—I saw the camera footage of the lab at Bart's. You _winked _at him, Sherlock—that's just shameless flirtation_."

_"It's all sorted now," Sherlock said firmly. "I don't want to talk about it. John is a valuable asset to my work."_

_"And you're _married _to your work, aren't you?" Mycroft chuckled. "Whatever it is that is causing the connection, Moriarty is going to use it. You can bet on it. This is no longer about just you or me, Sherlock—this could be about John. Are you quite willing to put him in danger?"_

_Sherlock shook his head vehemently. "John must not know about this."_

_"He won't—not if you do what we both know must be done."_

_Sherlock paused. "Can I…think about it?"_

_"There's nothing to think about."_

_"There's plenty to think about, Mycroft—you're asking me to join a man I loathe, a man who was responsible for nearly destroying my life before I was even 20 years old. You know this will take everything from me."_

_"I'm asking you to protect England. You're the only one who can do this and possibly win. Do you doubt your own intellect and acting abilities? Do you think you can't fool Moriarty?"_

_He scoffed. "Of course I can. I just don't want to know what I have to do to ensure that he believes me."_

_"It won't be pretty. But you'll have me on the other side to help you."_

_"I don't want to."_

_"You want to protect John, don't you?"_

_Sherlock gritted his teeth and admitted sullenly, "Yes."_

_"Take the night to think about it. We'll be in touch."_

* * *

_"I'm doing it. Tonight," Sherlock told him over the phone, as soon as John left the flat. _

_"You have the memory stick?"_

_"I don't understand why you gave me it—you know he won't believe it's real."_

_"That's not the point," Mycroft sighed on the other line. "He'll probably just chuck it into the pool. No loss. And you've decided?"_

_"Joining him is my only option. If I continue to fight against him, he won't stop until he's destroyed the both of us and taken over. At least I can try and gain his trust, work from the inside. But you must take care of John!" he hissed into the phone. "That is our agreement—nothing happens to John."_

_"I can only ensure that as long as you direct Moriarty's attention from him. And John will make it difficult. He believes in you, wants to protect you. He'd die for you, Sherlock. And he might try and prove that tonight."_

_"I won't let him."_

_"No, I rather think you won't." He sighed. "You know where he is, now?"_

_"Moriarty probably apprehended him minutes ago. I don't have much time." Sherlock paused on the other line. "To make this work, he's going to have to believe…that I've really crossed over. I need to make that clear, as soon as I can."_

_"It won't be easy."_

_"I have some ideas. Some I hope I don't have to use. The easiest thing to do is exploit the truth, first. But if he tries to get your help, you must seem heartless, Mycroft—you must seem like you've lost your faith. It's the only way this will work. John must feel like it's useless to come after me."_

_"I will do the best I can. Good luck. Until we speak again, little brother."_

* * *

Message delivered to Mycroft Holmes from an internet café from an anonymous email, 2 hours after the events at the pool:

IT'S DONE. BEGINNING TO PLAN. EXPECT FIRST STRIKE IN FOUR HOURS.

CAN'T GET THE FEELING OF HIM OFF ME—YOU OWE ME FOR THIS.

TRUST JOHN. HE'LL FIGURE IT OUT.

WATCH HIM.

* * *

_"Mycroft."_

_"Where are you?"_

_"Budapest. Jim's with Seb. He had his fun with me already. Is Lestrade—"_

_"He'll heal, Sherlock. He's going to be fine."_

_"He must—"_

_"He'll understand. What phone?"_

_"Took it from some tourist on the train. I'll chuck it out a window." Sherlock sighed. "He still doesn't believe me."_

_"You've hardly done much to convince him otherwise. Was kissing him really a good idea?"_

_"I thought it would play with his emotions—I didn't think he'd take it as evidence of my allegiance!"_

_"You should know better. Your attachment is showing."_

_"Can I help it? This whole thing, the only reason I'm doing this, letting that filthy man touch me, playing this part, is so I can come back."_

_"You will, soon. Get rid of this phone. No trails, we agreed."_

_"Until the next time. Watch—"_

_"I know, Sherlock."_

* * *

Message delivered to Sherlock Holmes' new cell phone (courtesy of Jim) from an anonymous number, 5 hours before the robbery of Bank of England.

BANK OF ENGLAND. ADORABLE. MY REGARDS TO JIM.

Sherlock deletes the message immediately after typing:

WRONG NUMBER.

* * *

_"Mycroft?"_

_"Yes?"_

_"I need someone to kill."_

_"…you'll need to keep their phone. Otherwise he'll be onto us."_

_"I think he might already be. Hence my need for someone to kill."_

* * *

_"Mycroft…"_

_"Shhh, shh—stop it, stop whining, he'll hear you! What phone?"_

_"Zwerling's. He didn't notice I'd taken it. Mycroft…"_

_"He's fine, Sherlock. In surgery now."_

_"I can't—"_

_"I know, I know. Are you crying? Stop it, STOP IT—you're Sherlock bloody Holmes, for heaven's sake!"_

_"I'm NOT crying."_

_"Good. I think you've gotten what you wanted."_

_"Yes. Jim's completely chuffed. Loved what I did. I think we have him now. And John—he won't believe me anymore."_

_"It's to protect him, Sherlock. It's to save the country."_

_"No."_

_"Moriarty would kill him first."_

_"He didn't see—I wish he would have seen, if he'd just looked at where Moran was pointing the gun—"_

_"It would have ruined everything. There's no point in hurting him if he still persists in the belief that you are on his side. You've saved him."_

_There was sniffing on the other end._

_"Sherlock, listen to me. You saved him tonight. You saved him and all those hostages—"_

_"Hostages I TOOK."_

_"—and thousands of young women. Just think about that."_

_"I'm not worried about the Zwerling woman."_

_"No, I didn't think you would be. Focus. The game's nearly up. I think you should make sure I'm invited to whatever's next. And Sherlock?"_

_"What?"_

_"I'll watch him. He'll live. And one day we'll tell him everything."_

_"If we live."_

_"If we live. Quite right."_

* * *

_"The Queen—he's targeting the Queen next."_

_"We have an advantage, then. I happen to know the palace quite intimately. You'll want to stage it in the private parlor in the East Wing. You have a plan for finishing him."_

_"Quintessentially British. I'm putting it in the tea."_

_"Which? Make sure it's one that gives you time, just in case."_

_"I'm not daft, Mycroft. But you'll remember the Quagmire case?"_

_"Yes."_

_"I'd say you should look into it again—and take note. This party could use some other form of liquid refreshment, as a back-up. I think he might be onto us."_

_"…I understand."_

_"Mycroft—"_

_"Yes?"_

_"…how is he?"_

_"Do you really want me to tell you?"_

_"No. I can already imagine. You'll know when to come."_


	18. Chapter 18

John woke up screaming the name of the wrong Holmes brother.

Or at least Lestrade thought so. The entire previous day had been dedicated to terror and panic at the hand of Sherlock Holmes and his associate. The country had become a madhouse overnight after Moriarty leaked the picture, and the entire Yard was on pins and needles, at a loss for how to save their helpless monarch.

At least the press could announce that the Queen was alive and well, safe in a royal hospital far from London. The public would calm down after hearing that, and the day the Queen had been taken would be soon forgotten by the masses.

Lestrade had staked out the Palace at Mycroft's helpful suggestion, waiting with an armada of policemen to try and help with whatever went down inside. He knew that it wasn't just the Queen in there, fighting for her life—it was John as well. Lestrade had been a mess, inwardly.

He hadn't heard the explosion, only answered the phone when it rang, and then he was barging in, smelling the smoke, and seeing the carnage.

Mycroft Holmes, dusty and battered and bleeding out of his chest but looking the same as ever. The Queen, bloody and unconscious on the floor—but alive. John, moaning on the ground and badly banged up. Half the room smoking, the other half on fire in earnest.

A body, enormous, on the floor behind a smash table. And what looked like the charred lower half of a man in a Westwood suit.

The entire crime scene, at Lestrade's scariest orders, had been extinguished first and then marked off later for investigation. Donovan was taking pictures and fingerprinting everything to bring back to him at the hospital, where Lestrade had insisted he be taken.

John had been back in surgery again to fix the gunshot graze to his side and the burned leg, and stitches were required for his back and forehead. Lestrade sat outside the surgery, fighting the urge to tear his hair out.

For the second time in one year, Sherlock had put John Watson in the hospital.

Molly came around as soon as she heard and waited with him. Some time between John's surgery and his subsequent move to the ICU, they found themselves holding hands.

His mind seethed with questions and ideas of what happened in the parlor with the Queen, and they all related to Sherlock and any sort of wild, cruel things he could have attempted. Mycroft, John, and the Queen of England all left bruised and bloodied. Sherlock gone without a trace.

Moriarty dead—evidently. The DNA would be the judge of that. Moran dead, too—for certain.

It didn't make a bloody lick of sense.

It didn't make any more sense when John fitfully tossed and turned in his sleep, saying bloody strange things like "Sherlock" and "don't open that champagne bottle" and "you made me the fetch the glass" and "drag me down to hell in a trapdoor."

Again, no sense at all. The most nonsensical of all was when John woke with a start and screamed, "MYCROFT!"

The heart monitor buzzed almost scoldingly as his heartrate spike. Lestrade leaned in to calm him. "Hey, hey, hey—calm, mate. Shhh, you're all right, you're back at Bart's. You're just fine, okay?"

"Mycroft…_Mycroft_, he was…is he?"

"No one's seen him since yesterday—he got his ribs taped up and he was out of here. Said he had things to take care of, the sod."

Molly interrupted. "It's okay, John—y-you're going to feel disoriented, but we're here, everyone's fine. You saved the Queen of England, if you didn't know."

"I…" John struggled to lean forward, arms shaking. He looked down at his leg and various bandages. "Mycroft's alive?"

"Yes, of course."

"I need to speak with him, immediately."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, mate!" Lestrade said. "You need rest. You got your bad leg burned up to your thigh, your whole back was sliced up and full of glass, and you needed stitches for your head and chest. You're bloody lucky to be alive, after all that."

John fell back against the pillows with a groan. "Mycroft…"

"We can call him later," Molly suggested cheerily.

"No, you don't understand—he could be dead, and I have to know—"

"Whoa, what are you on about? I already told you, Mycroft's alive. He wouldn't breathe a word of what happened, but I saw the hospital room after he left it—there was a Kevlar vest and packets of fake blood in the bins. Looks like he came prepared," Lestrade chuckled.

John shook his head. "Lestrade, you don't understand—I _need _this, Greg. Could you please…please just call him. For me. Then I'll do whatever you want, I promise. I'll sleep until Christmas. But I have to speak with him immediately."

Lestrade didn't respond.

"Greg. Lives could be at stake."

He sighed and dialed the number, handing his phone over to John. "I hope you know what you're doing."

John ignored that and focused on his breathing, keeping conscious under the heaviness of the drugs in his system, and the ring on the other end.

Four rings. Four breaths. Then:

"Greg. A pleasure to hear from you. How's our patient?"

"Mycroft? It's me."

"John? How lovely to hear your voice. Very reassuring."

"You need to come see me. Right now."

"I'm afraid I can't do that, John. Not at present. I have…things to attend to. Evidence to destroy. Stories to fabricate."

"No—_no_, Mycroft, you bloody fucking well listen to me, you enormous arse. I might be bloody well glad you're alive, but you have shit-loads of explaining to do and I'm not going to wait in a hospital bed while you do all this dirty work with Sh—" He stopped himself. "Just…please. I need answers."

"I don't know what you mean."

"I _heard _you, you bastard. After the explosion, I heard what you two said. I heard it all, and I'm pretty fucking baffled, all right?" He could feel his tongue beginning to slur the words. He needed precision. "You owe me."

"I owe you nothing. You wouldn't be alive if it weren't for me."

"You were involved, the whole fucking—I'm going to stop saying things so I don't implicate you, but you'd better get your arse over here in the next hour or I will find you and blow you to kingdom come, and you won't have a fucking Kevlar vest to protect you—"

"That's quite enough, thanks," Lestrade interrupted, taking the phone back. "Listen, Mycroft, could you just make a quick visit? He needs it. He's being belligerent." He smiled. "Brilliant. See you." He hung up the phone and announced, "Mycroft will be here. Behave yourself, John—he _did _save your life."

"He didn't…" John sighed, feeling sleepy and feeling angry about it. "You've got to keep me awake, Greg. I can't be under when he gets here—I need to talk to him."

Molly soothed him by laying a hand on his. "It's not really up to us."

"Molly. Slap me in the face if I'm about to sleep. Just do it."

It only took Mycroft fifteen minutes. He must have been in the area—or he'd sensed John's urgency. "As usual, John, you're prone to histrionics. I'm here, as you requested, even though by all accounts I should be resting, as my good doctor instructed."

"This good doctor instructs you to tell me what the fuck just happened to us."

Mycroft nodded sagely and turned to Lestrade and Molly. "Thank you ever so much for watching over him. I truly appreciate your loyalty. Trust me when I say you will be duly rewarded."

"We don't need a reward," Molly insisted. "Friends do this for each other."

"Well. Miss Hooper, Detective Inspector, if you wouldn't mind stepping out into the hall. I promise, all will be explained to you in due time."

Lestrade frowned before getting up with Molly to leave. "Glad to see you're okay, Mycroft. Don't know where England would be without you."

"Quite."

The hospital door closed quietly behind them, and Mycroft made his way slowly to the chair next to John's bed. John noted the slight wheezing from the two broken ribs. "John," he began, "I'm not quite sure you want to hear this from me, of all people."

"Mycroft, please. Just tell me. I think I already know…"

He cleared his throat. "Simply put," he said, "you were right all along. From the very beginning."

John blinked. "Go on."

"You were right. Sherlock was never on Moriarty's side—he was acting, as you guessed, to gain Moriarty's trust."

"Explain more."

"Moriarty…well, I was aware of him long before any of this. I knew how he targeted Sherlock at a young age to exploit my weakness, I knew of his involvement with getting Sherlock into his…well, into some dark times. But I thought he'd given up until Sherlock brought him to my attention, three nights after he met you."

"The cabbie."

"Yes—Sherlock and I worked from there to guess Moriarty's motives, and when it was clear that he still wanted to use Sherlock as a means of getting to me, we devised a plan: Sherlock would organize a meeting with the consulting criminal and offer his services to him, gaining entrance into his inner circle and Moriarty's trust. From the inside, he could work to eliminate Moriarty's strengths and destroy him before he could kill anyone else. Problem solved."

"That's it?" John asked, crossing his arms. "That's the whole story? You just decided one day to play pretend and send Sherlock to him? What did Sherlock think of that?"

"Oh, he _hated_ the idea—you must understand that. He loathed Moriarty, wanted nothing to do with this plot, but it became clear that…Moriarty had learned to exploit Sherlock's weaknesses as well."

John shifted forward. "Me?"

"If you take nothing from this explanation but this, please understand—Sherlock only agreed to go undercover and do everything he did when we learned that you were in danger."

"…Are you lying to me?"

"You knew from the beginning that Sherlock was trying to protect everyone, to save their skins. You knew what he was trying to do. That's what made it so hard—your trust in him put him in danger."

"So where do you come into all of this?"

"We kept in contact as anonymously as we could—stolen phones, deleted numbers, never leaving any evidence. He was walking a tightrope. He had to please Jim, orchestrate plots, and try and be two steps ahead at all times. And he asked after you, _constantly_. Every time he called."

John's stomach churned. "Well. I find that hard to believe, if you don't mind."

"Do you doubt it?"

"Of _course _I fucking doubt it—maybe you're forgetting the part where he killed a woman in cold blood."

"Anna Zwerling. Yes. I thought maybe you'd figured that one out. You were confused about that one, and others."

"What?"

"When investigating the kidnappings, you noticed that three victims did not work anywhere near Big Ben or Portcullis House. It bothered you."

"So?"

"So. Anna Zwerling, the first victim of the kidnappings, was chosen to die."

John flinched. "What?"

"When it became apparent," Mycroft said, "that Moriarty did not entirely trust Sherlock, we decided that we needed a definitive action that would make Moriarty place his faith in him while destroying yours. The problem with their relationship was always you—that's why they roped you into the game. Moriarty knew as long as you were alive, he'd never have Sherlock's heart, even if he insisted that he hated you. So someone had to die." Mycroft paused. "We chose carefully. It is a tricky matter, finding someone who deserves to die. It's not entirely up to us, as you know. But I'd come across a woman who from her outward appearance and apparent job title, seemed completely normal. An average woman, living alone, covering up her tracks."

"Tracks?"

"She was—to put it delicately—the owner of a rather large, rather illegal business."

"Selling?"

"Women." Mycroft shook his head in disgust. "Human trafficking. A slippery spider of a woman—she'd done a good job of hiding it from view. Sherlock agreed. And now Anna Zwerling is dead, and by my count, around one thousand girls are free to go to their families. I've been dropping discreet leads to Lestrade to help him find them and take them home."

John leaned back against the chair, flabbergasted. "Fucking hell. Just—fucking _hell_, Mycroft. This is too much to handle."

"Apologies. Should I stop?"

"No."

"Sherlock found her and took her first, waiting for another bigger story to cover his tracks. With no family to speak of, there wasn't a big fuss about her disappearance. Since five of the victims were taken from the same place, he didn't want to draw attention to his one kidnap outside of the Porcullis area, so he found two more random victims. Moriarty never guessed." Mycroft looked sadly at John's leg and asked, "I suppose you'll be asking about your…injury, as it were?"

John glared. "Yes. If you can explain _that_."

"No one but Sherlock himself could fully explain that. From what I learned from him, it was to put you out of harm's way. He said you were still willing to help him after Anna's death, still ready to believe."

"That's not…I…"

"Am I wrong?"

John rubbed his face. "I don't remember. I think—I think I was still trying to convince him. I'd said before I would accept him, so…so, no, not wrong."

"Yes. I thought so. He said that you hadn't seen Moran aiming at you from behind the gears. Moriarty gave him the signal to shoot, unbeknownst to Sherlock—he was done with you from that moment, but Sherlock noticed Moran and made a dramatic show instead—one he knew would eliminate the danger you were in as a target." He sighed. "He was crying on the phone that night. Sherlock Holmes seldom cries."

John felt anger and resentment boil inside him regardless. "Is that supposed to make me _feel better_?"

"No. It's only the truth. I'm not asking you to forgive him, John. He knows full well that he will answer for what he did. But he did it to protect you."

"No. _NO_. I don't believe—I don't think he'd—he didn't have to do _that_. If he was trying to protect me by breaking my _fucking leg _and screwing it up so I'd never walk without a cane again, he has a fucking ridiculous idea of protection. "

"His methods were unorthodox, yes, but effective."

"Oh, so it's _effective _as long as John is broken and alone, betrayed by his best mate in a hospital bed, wanting to die? If he wanted so badly to protect me, then _why did he make me want to die_?"

Mycroft glanced worriedly at the heart monitor. "Calm yourself, or the nurse will send you to sleep."

John opened his mouth to argue before taking a few calming breaths. "Right. Fine. I'll play along. So, all the crimes I heard about…"

"Some true, some true enough. I paid several gossip rags to promote crimes that may or may not have happened. Fear was the major element on that front."

"And the tea party…you knew you would be invited. You—the bloody champagne bottle."

"Sherlock's idea. Not really champagne, you know," Mycroft smirked, a bit chuffed at his own brilliance. "A highly combustible substance that would detonate with contact to oxygen. The bottle was airtight, but even then Moriarty suspected. Which Sherlock guessed—which is why he took it. To prove it was harmless to Moriarty. But that was only a back-up plan, since it would cause a lot of uncontrollable damage."

"The tea…" John remembered.

"Poisoned. A bit obvious, and risky, but Sherlock has developed an immunity to several toxins over the years. Occupational requirement. He knew what he'd put in there—it would kill Moriarty in seconds, but Sherlock could go for twenty minutes before succumbing. Of course, Moriarty suspected, and Sherlock was forced to drink."

"And shooting you…"

"All part of the plan. You heard about the bullet-proof vest. Sherlock chose the parlor specifically at my instruction, with my knowledge of the palace. I was going to drag the Queen down to the trap door in the ensuing confusion, but things took a turn for the worse when Moriarty revealed that he'd known of my involvement and Sherlock's true allegiance."

John wracked his brains for the memory of that. "Did he?"

"Oh, it wasn't all that obvious if you didn't know what to listen for. In any case, things took a turn for the worse, at which point, you will recall, Moriarty reached for the champagne he thought was safe."

"Sherlock told me to get a glass for him…" John remembered. "He was trying to get me out of the way."

"You wouldn't go. He sent the Queen instead and punched you in the face, if my hearing at the time serves me correctly."

John nodded, looking back at drug-addled memories. "He moved the both of us out of the way of the blast."

"Moriarty was dead the second it opened. The explosion blew off the top half of his body—a rather gory death, but I was wholly appreciative."

"Sorry I couldn't have killed the bastard myself."

"We all are, it would seem. Moran stormed in and realized what happened, and he immediately tried to shoot you, and he nicked you in the side. Sherlock shot him on sight, but he managed to fall over the trap-door we needed to escape."

John nodded again, weakly, and whispered, "I remember. He didn't…wasn't going to leave me there. I remember thinking I was in hell."

"Why?" Mycroft chuckled. "The fire?"

"No—you were there."

Mycroft guffawed.

"But that means," John said, cutting through Mycroft's bellowing laughter, "that…what I heard, what Sherlock said…"

"At this point in your relationship, do you doubt that Sherlock would do anything in this world to keep you safe?"

"Why?" He fisted the sheet around his leg and scowled. "He knew, he bloody _knew _how I felt, and if he'd…if he'd only given me a hint… That's not the treatment he should have given me."

"Sherlock has made many a grave mistake in this endeavor. So have I. I am sorry for my part in it, but despite the lengths it took to get here, tonight I will go to bed knowing that you're alive, that the Queen is alive, and that hundreds of people who would have died at the hands of Jim Moriarty will go on and live ordinary lives."

"I want to see him. Where are you hiding him?"

Mycroft paused. "You're really in no condition to—"

"Don't fuck with me, Holmes. I've heard your story and I'll take it into consideration, but he needs to come to me himself if he ever wants a chance at—"

"I don't know." Mycroft looked mournful. "I really don't know."

"You don't know _what_?"

"Where he is. He took the car and escaped. I haven't been in contact with him since."

John's mouth hung open in shock as he absorbed that, and he sank back into the pillows. "But if you…he…how long did he have to fight off that poison?"

"John."

"He…he could be dead. We wouldn't know."

"The driver would have taken him to a reliable doctor, trust me. He's probably recovering from getting his stomach pumped."

John shook his head silently, disbelieving.

"He couldn't come back, anyway, John. Surely you knew that. The crimes he did, for you, were quite real. He has killed and kidnapped and stolen and committed high treason—he's a fugitive now."

"You're his brother. You're the government."

"I have limits. And Sherlock knew them all, and did it anyway. For you. Take that into consideration." Mycroft got up to leave. "Good day, John Watson. Believe me when I say that both Holmes brothers are simply ecstatic that you are alive…even if one of us is not aware of that yet."


	19. Chapter 19

_He did all this to protect you._

John just wanted to close his eyes and sleep until he died. Thankfully, Lestrade and Molly seemed to understand that after Mycroft left, and they quietly suggested he get some rest before exiting. John was grateful. The nurse came in and put sedative in his IV, and he was under in seconds.

_Everything he did was for you. The robbery, the kidnapping, the murder, high treason…all so you could sleep safely at night._

John didn't want to believe that, not even in the security of unconsciousness. Sherlock hadn't just done it for him—he'd done it for England. He'd done it because no one else could.

_He didn't agree to it until you were in danger._

John grumbled in his sleep and tried desperately to stop _thinking _about that, about _him_, but he had no control over what he dreamt.

The timeline of this sick and twisted game played itself out, unbidden, beneath John's eyelids, and he could begin to see things between the lines, things he hadn't noticed, things he _should_ have noticed. But how could he have been expected to know that?

_Sherlock, licking his lips in excitement in the dim light of the pool. "The amount of entertainment we can enjoy from an intellectual battle pales in comparison to the...fun we can have...if we join forces."_

_"Write it off as one of those crazy things the Freak does."_

That's what he'd said—mocking himself. How was John meant to know?

He wasn't.

_"All my life, I've been different. Better. More. But everyone, everyone I knew, everyone who should have tried to help a boy growing up alone with a dizzying intellect and ability to see what others cannot, told me to shove it."_

That was true, that was so painfully true, and even if all of this had been a pack of lies, Sherlock had been honest here.

_"Told me to hide, John."_

And that was true, too, and it hurt John to think about it. The kernel of the truth that Sherlock knew was vitally important in creating a lie—Sherlock had the motive to join Moriarty. He had been unhappy.

He remembered mean comments, insults tossed out by supposed friends. Even Lestrade, Mycroft. Even himself.

_"You're just hopelessly in love with you flatmate, and that kills you."_

There was that kernel of truth again, and it worked both ways, John realized. Sherlock had figured out how John felt about him long before any of this had happened, or at least made him realize it.

But Sherlock…if it was possible…could apply the same thing to himself.

In love with John—and that killed him. It forced him to do things he never wanted to do, that love. If it existed, if John wasn't wrong.

_"It's completely about romance_."

No. John wasn't wrong.

_"Understand me when I say you are in danger of losing more than your life if you persist in the belief that you are special to me."_

_"I wanted to see what you looked like when you didn't hate me, one last time."_

_"Hopefully any love you had for me is gone."_

All the time, every time, giving him hints that he really did care, trying to push him away. If John had only listened—he should have known that Sherlock would always leave him clues. Always.

_"Let's say I joined Jim to take him down and everything I've done, from injuring Lestrade to framing you for robbery to murder, was all an elaborate scheme to keep you safe, because I'm in love with you…then why would I do this?"_

Exactly how much could John forgive? Sherlock didn't have to hurt him, torture him like that. He could have found another way to get John out of Moran's range. There were other ways.

There were other ways. Ways John could forgive.

_"You can't stand the idea of hurting me any more than I can stand the idea of you really teaming up with Moriarty."_

No, Sherlock hadn't said that—_he'd _said that. But he'd been wrong. He'd reminded Sherlock that Moriarty would never trust him unless he destroyed John, somehow. He'd made Sherlock break him.

No, no, no…

_"You and me, we've made an arse-load of mistakes, but I'm going to try and stop, and I'm accepting it. You. Now."_

_"I accept you, Sherlock Holmes."_

There was a limit—_a bloody fucking limit_—to how much John Watson could accept.

And Sherlock had known that: "_You can't accept this. This isn't who you are."_

_"Wake up, John, this isn't playing pretend."_

_"I accept you, Sherlock Holmes." "Someone's got to believe in you."_

_"Mycroft tells me you're my portable moral compass."_

Without his moral compass, what had Sherlock forgotten? What had he stooped to?

He'd killed someone—someone who deserved it, but it wasn't for him to decide.

He'd killed for John. John killed for him, and he'd do it again, a million times over. Did anyone really get to decide?

_"We all are evil, we're all wrong—to the point where there's, there's no definition of wrong anymore and only what people say is wrong…"_

_"I'm not leaving him, do you understand?"_

_"John, I'm sorry. Forgive me."_

He wanted to, he could see now, everything that Sherlock had tried to do. But—

But he couldn't. He didn't know how to look at Sherlock in the eyes he'd loved, the eyes he'd seen cloud with darkness before murder and pain…and forgive him. He wished he knew how. It would make everything so much easier.

He groaned out loud, feeling himself surface to consciousness, in the middle of his darkened hospital room. The bright green digital clock next to him said it was 2 in the morning—the hospital buzzed sluggishly outside his door. He silently thanked his lucky stars that Mycroft had pulled strings for his private suite.

"Sherlock," he sighed quietly, lower than a whisper. "Sherlock, you bastard. I don't know where to go from here."

"Perhaps we could start," a deep voice rumbled from across the room, "with groveling. Loads of it."

John jumped straight up in bed, heart immediately pinging quickly on the monitor machine. He willed himself to calm down. "H-how did you get here?"

"I still have a few tricks up my sleeve, if you can believe it."

"Mycroft…"

"Doesn't know I'm here. No one does, no one but you."

John frowned. "You've yet to explain why I'm so bloody special."

"I've yet to explain much."

"Why are you hiding?"

He could hear the sad, cynical smirk spread across Sherlock's features. "Perhaps I've learned to be comfortable here, in the dark."

"No. No more darkness, not anymore. I'm tired…Sherlock, I'm so bloody _tired_…"

He moved across the room slowly, tentatively, not wanting to upset him. "How are you feeling?"

"I don't know."

"Your injuries, I mean. I tried—I'm sorry, I knew the bottle would—"

"Please—_please_ stop telling me how sorry you are. It fucking _hurts_, all right?"

"John… I don't know what else to say." Carefully he sat in the bedside chair, but he did not lean in to speak to John. He leaned as far back as he could, as stiffly as he could. "I assume Mycroft told you everything."

"Yes."

"Do you believe him?"

"Do I have a _choice_?"

"Yes. Always." Sherlock coughed. "It's entirely possible that he lied and I'm the only remnant of Moriarty's inner circle, come to kill you."

John smiled. "You think you're so fucking clever. I _heard _you, after the bottle went off. You sap—you couldn't bear to leave me."

"Yes."

"So let's rule out that stupid suggestion, then. I have questions."

"I knew you would. I'll answer them all. No more games, I promise."

"No more games," John repeated dully. "Did you sleep with him?"

"Yes."

John cleared his throat. "How often?"

"Nearly nightly. Unless I could get out of it."

"Explain that to me. I thought you were…"

"A virgin? You know me, John Watson. Would I ever leave something as important to crime scenes as sex to supposition? I had to try it at least once…" Sherlock scoffed. "I know what you're going to ask, so I'll just tell you. Twice, in my life—once with a girl and once with a man, both in uni. Entirely unsuccessful experiments. I wasn't interested."

"Of _course _you weren't interested if you treated it like an experiment." John closed his eyes and leaned back onto his pillow, exhausted and hurting already. "Why, Sherlock?"

"I needed the data at the time."

"No, why did you have sex with the filthiest, lowest creature in all of England?"

"Jim liked to…get very close with his associates. He alternated between Moran and me. I had no choice, I—I had to make him believe me. I had to keep him occupied, keep his mind off you."

"Right. You just screwed Jim Moriarty to help me. Brilliant."

"Don't mock me, John. If you think for one moment that I enjoyed that _tedious, disgusting…painful…_" Sherlock stopped talking, and John felt guilty for asking about it. He should have known that Sherlock would never want that. He'd never seemed to want it with someone he liked, much less hated.

He hated to think of Sherlock, lying there and taking it from Jim, or worse…trying to convince him of his enthusiasm. John shivered. "So, when Moriarty played the first few games against us, with the pips and the bombs…"

"The case of the memory stick was a real one, but Mycroft already knew who the murderer was and what happened. So did I. We needed to keep you occupied, away from Moriarty as much as possible."

"All to protect me."

"Yes."

"Why?" John asked. "Sherlock, why am I so important to you? Why did you only do this once you knew I was in danger?"

Sherlock frowned and looked away, unwilling to answer. "Surely I don't need to say it. I thought I had expressed myself adequately."

"Sherlock. Words. I deserve to hear them."

He sighed, exasperated. "John, you know by now that I—I've grown very attached, to you. You were my best and only friend, and I would have done anything to keep that balance."

"Friendship, was it?"

"_Yes._"

He shook his head. "You're such a fucking liar. I told you, _I told you _how I felt, how _you _made me feel, and you know that not easy for me to admit. You were all I had."

"It's not easy for me to admit, either."

"I don't love you anymore," John clarified, trying to read Sherlock's face. If he could believe his eyes, he could have sworn he saw a frown. "I did, back when—back when things were simpler."

"And love vanishes immediately after strife? Funny, the stories never seem to say that. They all speak of the enduring power of love through all problems."

"No, love vanishes when you shatter it into a million pieces with your foot and destroy my chance at ever functioning on my own. I'm not the John Watson you were trying to protect anymore. I'm John Watson, the almost-corpse."

"_NO_," Sherlock growled. "You're not—you're _fine_, John, you're completely functional…"

"Then explain why. Why did you do this to me?" John asked angrily. "I understand the woman, and the Queen, and your brother, I even understand the sex, but why this? And why Lestrade?"

"Accident."

"He was. I wasn't."

"You know Moran was aiming for—"

"You could have shoved me out of the way, talked your way out of it—no, what you did to me was inexcusable. It was too precise, too cruel to be spur-of-the-moment, even for you."

Sherlock looked pained. "It _was_."

"No."

"The fact that it was your old limping leg only sweetened the deal for Moriarty. It was the only injury to incapacitate you just enough without killing you—a broken arm wouldn't have done it, and I _never_would have risked shooting you."

"Then answer me this," John hissed. "Be completely honest—the entire time you were doing this, working for Moriarty, hurting people, creating crimes out of your own imagination—did you ever enjoy it?"

Sherlock was silent for a long time. The only sound of the room was the beep of the heart monitor and the drip of the IV. His eyes flickered up to John, momentarily vulnerable, shaky—but unapologetic. "Yes."

John swallowed. "Right, then." He turned over to his side and said, "I think you should leave now."

"You said it yourself—there's darkness in each and every one of us, and we all long to release it. I couldn't help but _enjoy _the idea of the crimes, sometimes, but I never invested myself in that evil."

"You did, Sherlock. I saw it in your eyes."

"Eyes are not evidence."

"They are to me."

Sherlock bit his lip and leaned in closer, even though John's back was turned. "John…what do I have to do? I'll do anything you ask, anything you want—it was for _you_, John. I'm sorry it was. I'm sorry I can't say honestly that it was for the safety of the commonwealth, but I fought against those instincts in myself to protect the one person on earth I truly care about."

"Oh, you _care _now? That's a relief."

"Don't be absurd, John, of course I care. Sentiment's been my downfall from the beginning." He continued to lean over. "John. _Please_. Tell me to do anything, anything to make it up to you, to redeem myself. I'll go if you want, all you have to do is ask. I'll turn myself in."

"You wouldn't."

"Do you want to test that?" Sherlock asked, and John turned to see him holding out a phone. "I can have the police here in seconds."

"Oh, you complete _tosser_—no, put the phone away. I can just imagine you wallowing in your guilt in jail. It makes me sick." He lay on his back and stared at the ceiling. To his utter surprise, Sherlock lowered his head on the bed and sighed. "You were poisoned."

"Mmm. Yes."

"Bloody stupid of you, that."

"Necessary."

"And you thought I wouldn't care, if you died?" John asked. When Sherlock lifted his head in inquiry, he rolled his eyes. "I heard you, remember? You said you didn't think I'd be too displeased if you died."

"You did say you were sorry you didn't get to finish me off yourself."

"On the day you die, Sherlock Holmes, I will still be saying that. Perhaps just in a different context." He groaned.

"Leg?"

"Hurts. Thanks very much."

"I'm sorry."

"Stop apologizing. You know I don't want to hear it."

Sherlock nodded fearfully before launching his head back on the bed, shooting a pale hand out to grasp John's. John could feel him shaking. "_Forgive me_. _Please_."

"No. I'm sorry, not tonight. Maybe not ever. Understand?"

"Yes." He sniffed and scanned the room. "A night nurse will be here soon to check on you. I should go."

"Yes. You should."

He nodded and stood up from the chair. "I'm sure Mycroft told you," Sherlock said, "that I'm a fugitive now. I won't be able to come back to England."

"I know."

"I…well. You don't have to forgive me. That is entirely in your power, John Watson. And you don't have to try and find me, either."

"Then I guess I got what I wanted," John decided. "I got to make sure your sorry arse was still alive, and I got to see you grovel, and I suppose it's time…to say goodbye."

Sherlock blinked. "Yes. I suppose."

"Yes. Well."

"Well. Goodbye, John."

"Goodbye."

Sherlock nodded once, then slipped through the door, and John watched him go, his entire body screaming at itself for how it felt. It was good to see that toxic man leave his life, forever, if he wanted. Good riddance.

If he didn't see him one more time, he _would_ die. "Sherlock—Sherlock, wait—wait, please!"

The door still swung closed. He began to panic. "Sherlock. SHERLOCK!"

Then, blessedly—the door reopened. "If your goal is to alert the entire British Empire that I'm here, John, you have been entirely successful."

"Shut up, you twit. Get back here. _Now_."

Sherlock walked fluidly back into the room and sat back down while John lifted himself up off his back and tried to face him. "I don't forgive you."

"No. And you don't love me either. Did you call me back simply to cause me more pain, John?"

"It's not—yeah, probably. I don't—ugh, it's so complicated, Sherlock. I don't know how love works in this situation. I don't think it's a matter of loving you, I think it's a matter of trusting you."

"Can one exist without the other?"

"I used to think they couldn't. But—fuck, Sherlock, when I woke up, thinking you might be dead in some alleyway, poisoned, I didn't know what to do. What to think. So that's a point in your favor, I think."

"Possibly."

"And you," John said. "You don't love me."

"Love is too complicated, as you said, for someone like me to try and delve into."

"You don't bloody _delve _into it, Sherlock. You just are or aren't. So are you or aren't you?"

"Yes."

"Yes, _what_?"

"Yes, I am. Obvious, don't you think?" Sherlock scoffed. "Tedious thing. If I didn't, this all would have been so much more efficient. Less emotional."

John could feel his heart soaring—and his brain whacking his heart down with a cricket bat. He should not be happy to know that someone loved him so much they would murder, sleep with psychopaths, and break limbs for him.

On the other hand, it really did sound like Sherlock's way of going about it. "Oh."

"Yes."

"You love me."

"I dislike repetition."

"_Don't _say that, Jim always said that."

"_I _said it first, and he's just a pitiful—"

But John could stand it no longer—he grabbed Sherlock by the scarf and yanked him forward so their faces were only centimeters apart. "I think I've had enough talking, don't you agree?"

Sherlock swallowed, eyes flickering all over John's face. Data collection. "What did you have in mind?"

John leaned forward and kissed him. He meant for it to be rough, like their first kiss. Scraping, crashing, pure passion that singed the edges of his senses. But it wasn't, because Sherlock changed it—tender, soft, close. Painful by proximity. John thought he might cry out.

Sherlock broke away. "This is…unhealthy."

"Very. But it's pretty fucking good."

Sherlock leaned forward this time, bracing one arm on either side of John, and slowly pushed him down into the hospital bed. All slow, all passionate, all meaningful. Painful.

"Besides," he whispered when Sherlock shifted his kisses to the crown of John's head, "I wouldn't want your last kiss in England to be with that spider of a man."

Sherlock chuckled. "I don't count those."

"Did you count the one in the basement file room?"

"No. Hurt too much. _This_ counts, and it is my very _best _kiss in England." He brought his lips back to John's, slowly tracing John's upper lip with his tongue before trailing open-mouthed, desperate kisses along John's jaw.

"_Is_ it-?"

"I thought you said no more talking," Sherlock growled under his ear, and John promptly shut up. He just breathed in the scent of Sherlock—a bit of antiseptic, a bit of smoke, a bit of expensive cologne, utterly Sherlock—and threaded his fingers in his hair. He just focused on the simple, smoldering slow burn of their lips together. One day, if they ever got another day, John might take control of the kiss. John might flip Sherlock onto his back and explore all the places Sherlock was finding on him, now, but that wasn't tonight.

Tonight was trying to force two torn edges together and willing them to heal. It wouldn't work, but the effort felt good.

"I think…I think I might still…underneath it all…"

"I know," Sherlock whispered. "I can wait."

"It might take forever. Years."

"I can wait."

"I…"

"I know, John. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry."

John nodded, tucking Sherlock's curly head under his chin and trying to hold back tears. "Thank you."

He was happy to stay like that for the rest of his life, wordless, just being near him, never quite forgiving but never stopping, not for a moment, this complicated, twisted, sick love that still burned in his heart despite everything his brain said.

No forgiveness. He couldn't.

But he couldn't _not _love the man.

Sherlock tensed—there was noise outside. "I have to—"

"No."

"John."

"_No_." His hands tightened in Sherlock's hair. "Please. If you go…"

"You wanted me to."

"I don't know what I want. I just want you, in any capacity I can get you."

"Not imprisoned, then." Sherlock pressed a fierce kiss to John's head. "I have to go."

"Sherlock…"

"Thank you, John…I might not have your trust yet, but I have this, and that's enough for me to live for." Sherlock bowed his head gravely. "I will owe you for the rest of my life, for that."

"Sherlock, _please_," John begged, and the broken emotion behind his voice must have cracked something in Sherlock. He came back, gently cradling John's bruised face, and kissed him once more.

"Just think about things. For me," Sherlock said. "Please, do this for me. And heal, as much as you can, for me."

"I haven't forgiven you yet."

"I know." Sherlock left the room without another word as activity flurried near his room, and as he left, John could hear him bark at a nurse. "There, you are, _finally_! My husband has been moaning in pain for hours—we hit the call button twenty bloody minutes ago! Could you see to him? Room 307? _Thank _you!"

John smiled. Playing the disgruntled spouse to get out scot-free. Disguise was only a self-portrait, after all.

A jumpy nurse scooted inside the room, administering a sedative immediately. "Sorry, sir, we must have missed your call."

"That's all right," John said as drowsiness overtook him. "My, er, husband…gets very protective of me, sometimes."


	20. Chapter 20

There were only two things worse than being in love with someone who was gone, John decided.

The first—being in love with someone who he might never, ever seen again. Who could be anywhere in the entire world, could even be _dead_, and he'd never know.

The second—being in love with someone who he shouldn't be, by all accounts, in love with. This was so much worse, infinitely worse. John transitioned back to 221B, making his way around slowly. His stitches itched, especially on his back, and he had to move around the flat stiffly. Each step was an effort that sent sparks of pain down his side, from his bullet wound to his foot, and some days he would throw his cane against the wall, crumple on the floor, and just sob. Sob for the things he'd lost.

The man he'd lost. He hated him, he _hated _him, so much. He could barely move around the flat by himself, and he always needed that bloody cane, and it was Sherlock's fault.

He _hated _him.

He would cry silently, stoically, for Sherlock Holmes and the way he'd tortured him. He would cry because he _needed him_, back in his life once more, to make his life have some semblance of normalcy.

John felt useless—Sherlock would never make him feel useless, not for one second. Sherlock would remind him how special he was.

Sherlock would remind him exactly _why_ he was hurting, each and every day. There was no way out of this.

Mycroft had told Lestrade, Molly, and Mrs. Hudson the real story and sworn them to absolute secrecy, at least until he could gather enough evidence to possibly, one day, clear Sherlock's name.

The women had been pleased, relieved, and Lestrade had thrown such a strop that after screaming at Mycroft over the phone for well over an hour, he locked himself in his office for a full 24-hours. When he finally came out, he refused to talk to anyone but John.

"He told you, then?" he'd asked urgently over the phone.

"Yes. Last week, in the hospital."

"Fucking. HELL. I can't believe it."

"I know what you mean."

"Fuck. _Fuck_. Want to get a pint?"

"Yes, please."

* * *

"I don't know _how_," John confessed to Mrs. Hudson while they were watching crap telly. "I've no idea. How am I supposed to get over something like this?"

Mrs. Hudson gazed thoughtfully at the telly. "I don't think you _have _to get over anything, love. It's entirely up to you."

"I hate that. I hate that I have to make the decision. Couldn't someone just order me to forgive, not give me a choice?"

"All right. I order you to forgive him."

John groaned. "I miss him. I need…I need to see him. But I don't think I can, not just yet."

"When do you feel like you can?" she asked.

"I don't know. When I feel like I can live with that knowledge, I guess. I doubt he'd be able to put up with me at this point. I'm damaged goods."

"Oh, pish posh!" Mrs. Hudson scolded. "If we're being totally honest, you were damaged when you first moved in, and Sherlock fixed that. He made you feel whole again."

"That was a psychosomatic limp, Mrs. Hudson—this is real. Sherlock can't fix what he's caused."

"Perhaps not," she replied. "Would you feel better if you were with him, dear?"

"I don't know."

"Well, love, I'm no therapist, but it would seem to me that you really do still care about Sherlock, and he certainly has a soft spot for you. Oh, I hate it when you two have a row…"

John rolled his eyes. This surpassed all previous definitions of 'row.'

"Maybe you need to see it from Sherlock's perspective, dear," she suggested. "If you knew someone was threatening Sherlock and would kill him in a wink, would you do what he did?"

"I've been asking myself that for ages. I still haven't figured it out."

She smiled sympathetically. "Give it a good thinking over. I always feel better after a good thinking-over…"

John gave it a good thinking-over that night, staring at the ceiling from his bed which he'd wished had one more occupant every previous night. If Moriarty, or someone like him, threatened Sherlock, of _course _he would have done what he could to save him. He would have joined him on the spot.

If their situations were reversed and Moriarty asked John to join him to save Sherlock's life, John wouldn't even have the cleverness to come up with a plan to ultimately overthrow him. He would have joined him for real, for Sherlock's sake.

Was that worse? It had to be worse.

John couldn't quite see himself putting the bomb in the Yard—he'd endanger too many people. But Sherlock had known that no one would die that day. He could see himself stealing 750 million quid and even kidnapping the people from the Tube. He could even see himself killing that awful woman, once he knew what he did about her. For Sherlock's safety, for the safety of England, he could very well see himself doing all those things.

Now. If he saw that Moran was going to shoot Sherlock, but Sherlock didn't see, and he only had seconds to take Sherlock out of the equation without killing him…would he have broken Sherlock, too?

For some time, he didn't think he could take that guilt—Sherlock's cries of pain, twisted limbs, blood…

Then he thought about the gun more, and seeing Sherlock lying cold in a pool of his own blood or writhing in it, alive but wishing he were dead. He didn't know what was worse. He didn't know what he could handle.

Sherlock made a very difficult decision that night.

He still didn't feel like that redeemed him.

It went on like this for two more weeks. The same routine—getting up, hobbling around, staring at walls, trying to figure out where one draws the line between ultimate devotion and falling off the cliff of morality.

And then at 3 o'clock on a Sunday afternoon, John called Mycroft and asked for a location and a favor. He packed a bag of warm jumpers, basic toiletries, passport, remaining funds (not much). He called Mrs. Hudson and told her he was going on a spur-of-the-moment holiday, and if he wasn't back in two weeks, she should look for a new tenant.

He didn't want to say goodbye to 221B. But it was only a flat. It wasn't what he needed anymore.

He sent letters to Molly, Harry, and Lestrade, figuring they'd get the letters too late to do anything about it, and called Mycroft one more time on his way to the airport.

"Hi, Mycroft—it's all done. You have them ready?"

"It would be much, much easier to simply fake your death. The paperwork's a lot smoother."

"Nah, that won't do. I don't want them to think I'm dead—that would hurt them too much. This way, they think I'm doing something, at least."

"All right, I'll send it through. It'll take quite a bit of turning a blind eye, on the army's behalf…"

"You owe me, Mycroft Holmes. I'll send updates."

"Much appreciated. Good luck, John Watson."


	21. Chapter 21

The thing that most people failed to realize about Sherlock Holmes was that above all, he was an artist.

Scientist, yes. Consulting detective—preferred title. Brother—unfortunately. Englishman, technically.

Fugitive, for the time being.

But people assumed that he was what his occupation was, with the heart of a scientist to match his brilliant brain.

Absurd, of course. One had only to look into his old flat to see that. Scientists at heart lived by organization. Scientists kept things clean and neat, and Sherlock secretly thrived in chaos, at least at home. He _was _the man who kept body parts in places they shouldn't be, after all.

No—Sherlock had a scientific mind, but an artistic heart. It was obvious—why couldn't people _see_that? He craved creativity, he lived in near-squalor and disorganization. He wanted crimes to be a work of art. He played the violin to think.

Artistry. Sherlock craved artistry. That's what made being a detective so perfect. So few people realized that there was no real divide between logic and beauty, because logic, mathematics, physics, motives—they were all _gorgeous_.

Ordinary patterns. Boring. Dependable. Lovely.

That's what made Prague so perfect.

Sherlock loved London, with its urban sprawl and busy clamor, because it was so _big_, so buzzing with organized chaos.

London—not an option. Give Mycroft time.

Prague—better option. It would do. Besides, Sherlock had always liked Prague. It was almost its own hidden world which operated seamlessly in a Gothic sort of way. The colors, the shapes were different here.

Cobblestones. Dolls in shop windows. Street performers caked with make-up, playing outdated instruments. Hidden, twisted alleys. Streetlamps and shadows.

Fascinating.

_"You can't come back to England. Not even for him."_

_"That won't be a problem. He's refused to see me."_

_"Can you expect anything more out of him? He's just a man, Sherlock."_

_"Wrong—he is much more. Where are you relocating me?"_

_"Paris. Your French is up to par, I assume?"_

_Sherlock didn't like Paris. He'd leave the day after he arrived._

_"I assume you'll try and fly the coop after you arrive—just keep in touch. And no more sleuthing. You can't draw attention to your identity."_

_"I understand, Mycroft."_

Mycroft was stupid. Helpful, but stupid. What was Sherlock meant to do if he couldn't solve anything?

Sherlock tried, in earnest, for his own safety. He spent days at a time learning the intricacies of Prague and desperately seeking something artistic to revel in. Anything to take his mind off where he was and why he was exiled there.

There were small things to pass the time. The astronomical clock, for instance, built in 1490. Legend said that various occult mysteries were encoded in the symbols of the clock.

Tedious. Sherlock deciphered the code in days. _Dull_.

The same clock, every hour, released wooden saints from the trapdoors and played a little puppet story about morality. Very fitting.

Gargoyles and gods stared down from Staré Mêsto. Tombstones piled high in Starý Židovský hřbitov. A mess of styles and eras in Prague Castle. Plenty to observe. Sherlock loved it at first, because there was so much to calculate and take in. The physics behind a flying buttress or Gothic spire.

It took about two days for Sherlock to get distracted. Distraction—nasty. Painful. He didn't like to think—

Not about him.

No.

If Sherlock spent months, _years_, waiting for him to come and forgive him, he would definitely waste away. And John wouldn't want him to waste away.

John.

How, how, _how_ had he been so utterly foolish? How had he been compromised so quickly by another human being?

He wanted…

He wanted to go back. He wanted to change things. He'd made too many errors, hurt too many people. He should have cut his losses, shot Moriarty as soon as they were alone, consequence be damned. He'd be dead, but John wouldn't hate him so much. It's hard to hate a dead man. Sentiment gets in the way.

He wanted him back.

Try as he might, Sherlock couldn't avoid thinking about John. Surrounded by beauty, by quirk and style, Sherlock could only think of how gorgeous, _gorgeous_, John was.

Gorgeous because Sherlock didn't think it possible for someone who seemed so maddeningly ordinary to be so surprising. John was both constant and unpredictable. John could be depended on—tea, jumpers, griping about fungi samples in the microwave. John was always changing—soldier, doctor, partner, flatmate, detective.

John would smile at Sherlock when he said something clever. John didn't even _know_ how blindingly perfect he was, didn't understand how Sherlock could never let that perfection die. Putting John in danger was never an option.

He wanted John back. He knew he didn't deserve it, didn't deserve him. He'd gone too far.

He still couldn't help himself.

_"Prague, dear brother? I'll admit I'm surprised…"_

_"Has he said anything to you?"_

_"No."_

_"What's he been doing?"_

_"Sherlock, I am NOT going to be your liaison. Be patient."_

_"Mycroft, please."_

_"…He went out for drinks with Lestrade last night. Came back stumbling drunk, fell up the stairs. The cane got in the way. Fell asleep in your chair."_

_"He should be more careful."_

_"Mmm. He can take care of himself."_

Sherlock, of course, could not be expected to stop his business as a consulting detective. He had to have something to devote his mind to, or else it would wander somewhere bad, somewhere irreversible. But he needed security if he was going to go about it.

There was a pub he liked—it reminded him of his skull back home. It was dark, made of stone, and underground, with lamps and moth-eaten velvet booths. Coffins functioned as tables. He loved it.

There were dimly lit booths in the back, usually reserved for amorous couples. Sherlock paid the owner of the pub to keep one booth, cramped and hidden in back, with the light off.

He'd used the excellent homeless network here to spread rumors underground about a man who was willing to solve crimes, under the table, no questions asked.

People started to come in trickles. He solved most cases from the table, but sometimes he'd go out into the city and solve it from there. He made sure the clients never saw his face.

It was distraction. He needed distraction. Needed artistry. Needed John.

* * *

"Th-They said you could help me," the woman said in nervous Czech. "I've already gone to the police, and since it's only been 24 hours, all they can do is file a missing person's report…"

"You have reason to believe that he is in real danger?"

"He…we have a lot of debts, sir. He had people that he owed. Debts I can't tell the police about."

"Ahh." He leaned back, further into obscurity, and pressed his hands to his lips. "You think his creditors killed him to settle the score."

"I—I would not put it past them, sir."

The darkness was thick—he could only tell she was shaking from the small tremors through the table. "Stop worrying. It will get you nowhere."

"I'm—I'm sorry?"

"He isn't dead, ma'am. If he were, you would have received a warning that you were next. No, they want ransom, or labor, if you can't pay for his return."

"I—what am I to do?"

"When was he taken?"

"Last night. He went to throw out the trash…"

"Who exactly do you owe?"

"The Skullcatchers."

Sherlock smiled. A Czech gang, sometimes associated with the Golem. "They keep headquarters by the Vltava River. They keep hostages in the River Bank Hostel during the winter months. I'd start there, go to the police, get them to send a small troop to the hostel. Your husband will be fine."

"Th-thank you, sir, _thank you_."

"Nothing of it. You can see yourself out. Come back tomorrow if there are any problems, or if I was wrong. But I'm rarely wrong."

She left, whispering profuse thanks, and Sherlock waved her off. "Next, please."

He should have been paying attention.

Metal against the floor.

Thumping, uneven—indicating a limp.

Smell of a leather jacket, familiar.

"Hi," the voice said, English. Sherlock tensed. "I'm here to get help in a missing person's case. I heard you were the man to go to."

Sherlock breathed in, once. Exhaled. Tried to stop his hands from shaking. "Yes."

"Brilliant. I lost someone a few months ago. Need to find him, but the police can't know I'm looking for him."

"Did he give you any indication of where he was going?"

"No. But I got a tip from his brother that he'd be in the city."

Sherlock smiled, shaking still. Thank goodness he was shielded. "But you don't know where specifically."

"I heard whispers when I got here. They all pointed to you… I mean, they told me you were the man for it."

"I _am_." Sherlock folded his hands under his chin and leaned forward. "Who is this man?"

"A friend. My best friend, and I really want him back."

"Ah. Why did he leave?"

"Because he was a complete bastard."

"Then why do you want him back?"

"Because I want some more data," John said, "to test out my hypothesis."

"What's the hypothesis?"

"You can be totally, horridly in love with someone, but not trust them."

Sherlock wrinkled his nose. "I think 'horridly' is a bit insulting. To me."

"Who said I'm talking about _you_, Holmes?"

"_John_," he whispered, desperate, feeling his heart bubble and break. Sentiment. Weakness. _John_. He reached across the table for John's hand, and to his surprise, John didn't pull away.

Instead, he traced patterns on Sherlock's wrist and long fingers, and Sherlock shivered with the power of proximity.

He cleared his throat. "Mycroft told you."

"He owes me big-time."

"And you're here…for me."

"Figured you'd be a lonely sod, moaning all the time about how _tedious _life is without me."

"It is."

"I'm here, aren't I?"

Sherlock nodded, cursing the darkness now. It kept John's features out of sight. He began to move his hand slowly, rotating his wrist as John continued his reassuring patterns. "Why are you here, John?"

"I missed you. I…needed…."

"I know. Me, too."

"Hell, I wish I could see you. Dodgy place you picked, mate."

"You haven't forgiven me so quickly."

"No," John said uncertainly. "No… I'm working on it. I thought we could work on it, together."

"Possible. Entirely possible." Sherlock swallowed. "You said you love me."

"Yes. I do. And you love me back, you berk. I knew you were going to wallow…"

"I wasn't _wallowing_!" Sherlock hissed, but that only made John giggle.

"Right. Well, I already spoke with Mycroft—he wanted to fake my death, so I couldn't be tracked here, but that would only hurt our friends back home, losing both of us. So he faked some military paperwork, clearing me to work at a military base as a medical consult."

Sherlock frowned. "They think you went back to the army?"

"I wrote letters…told them this was what I needed to do to clear my head." John's grip tightened on Sherlock's wrist. "I can always go back, if you don't want me here."

"I do. Don't be absurd. I simply assumed you wouldn't want to see me again."

"Don't be a git. You remember how much I wanted you to stay with me in the hospital."

"You were full of painkillers," Sherlock pointed out, "and you were a bit…overstimulated."

John snorted. "Wouldn't mind being a little more overstimulated, if you know what I mean."

"John, there is a time and place for sex jokes. This isn't one of them," Sherlock said. "Are you really sure you want to do this? Give up your life back in London, be on the run with a fugitive that you love but still cannot trust?"

"You're going to earn that trust, Sherlock," John replied. "I think you can manage that. It might take a while, but I'm sure you'll get creative with ways to make it up to me. And in case you were wondering, that _is _meant to be sexual."

Sherlock resisted the urge to growl. "You want this?"

"I want you. I don't have anything else in my life, outside of you. Probably pretty bloody unhealthy, but it's what I want. I'm willing to take the best of what you can give me with all our baggage, Sherlock." John leaned in. "Let's make a deal. I won't bring up anything—_anything—_that happened over the past few months, but you aren't allowed to either. No wallowing in guilt, whatsoever."

"Are we to just forget everything that happened?"

"Not forget. Move on. I can't live like this…thinking about what you did and why you did it. It's been driving me mad, and it hurts too much." John lowered his voice. "It took us a while, but it's you I want. I can't have you if I keep thinking about how much you've hurt me, but I can't live without you. I know that now. So we take it one step at a time."

"Everything I did," Sherlock reminded him, a bit brokenly, "was because I love you."

"I know that. Let it go, Sherlock. _Please_."

Sherlock didn't know how he could ever do that. If John stayed, miraculously, and never got fed up with the memory of what happened lingering over them, _he _could not be counted upon to forget. Everyday, he'd see John limping, aching, and he'd remember.

John squeezed his hand. "You love me."

"Obvious."

"Say it again?"

"I dislike repetition."

"I don't fucking care. Again."

Sherlock didn't know how to argue, so he just leaned over the table, clasping John's hands, and pressed his cheek against John's.

Pulse elevated. Like a rabbit's. Breathing quickly, shallowly.

"I love you," Sherlock said, "if that's ever going to be enough."

"It is, for now," John said softly, and he tilted his head to kiss Sherlock. Before he eliminated the negative space between them, he whispered, "_Let_ _go_."

It might take years, Sherlock reasoned as they kissed in the dark, but he imagined, with _this_ kind of encouragement, that he could learn how.

* * *

**Thank you, thank you, thank you. I hope you've enjoyed this journey as much as I have. Please leave reviews and comments and lovely wishes. Happy Christmas!**


End file.
